MAMMALOGY. 



Before we enter upon the Natural History of a Being so extra- 

 ordinary as the Orang-Outang, one of the most interesting of its race, 

 and perhaps the primate of the Simia tribe, it may not be amiss to 

 enquire whence those feehngs of dishke arise with which that tribe in 

 general is regarded by every inconsiderate observer. It may be 

 demanded whether those feehngs are not inherent in our nature : or 

 have not their origin in our prejudices rather than our under- 

 standings : and above all, whether they result not from a disappoint- 

 ment of these immediate anticipations of our mind, which it is 

 unreasonable in ourselves to form ; and of those erroneous estimates 

 of the extent of their intellectual powers, correctness of manners, 

 affections and sociability which their remote resemblance to the hu- 

 man form is at the first glance so fully calculated to inspire. 



The horse, the dog, the sheep, almost every animal of the 

 quadruped race becomes at times the object of our delight and favour, 

 while those near approximations in similitude to the human frame 

 excite sensations altogether different. Every trait of intelligence, 

 docility, and mildness in the former, is the theme of admiration : 

 while the sagacity of the latter fail to satisfy to our ideas, because we ex- 

 pect too much. Where we find so much resemblance in the form, we 

 are too apt to expect a like resemblance in their actions ; and we look 

 for habits of life dictated and controuled by an analogous intelligence. 

 Our expectations are regulated by the standard to which their 

 external forms bear a similitude, and forgetting the condition of the 

 human race in a state of untutored nature, we would fain draw the 

 parallel between man as perfect in his mind and person as the creator 

 has ordained, and those beings of the forest whose mental perceptions 

 are scarcely more than instinct sharpened by necessity into adroitness: 



