PLATE LVII. 



there is another difficulty still greater than either to overcome, namely, 

 the comparative length of the arms : for these, as they appear in the 

 figure given by Bontius, are of the same length as in the human 

 frame. Linnaeus, however, tells us more explicitly that when the 

 animal stands erect, the ends of the fingers reach to the knee, adding 

 at the same time, that in the human frame the finger ends, when the 

 arm hangs down, reach only to the middle of the thigh, and this we 

 know are the usual proportions. If this observation upon the length 

 of the arm in the animal of Bontius be correct, it at once affords a 

 distinction that removes it from the rufous Orang-Outang, as will 

 appear by comparing the specific character which we have assigned 

 to the latter animal " bracMis longissimis^'* for instead of being of a 

 moderate length, as in the human frame, when the animal stands 

 erect with the arms down, the ends of the fingers very nearly touch 

 the heel : this we have fully ascertained to be the case in the animal 

 when living, as well as from the skeleton, and the stuffed skin in the 

 Museum of the College of Surgeons. Were it not for the much 

 shorter length of the arm in this animal of Bontius, we should almost 

 conclude that the white variety, as it is termed, of Simia Lar (the 

 Gibbon or Long-Armed Ape) must be the animal intended ; but we 

 have been so far fortunate as to have seen these creatures,* and can 

 venture to say that in these, as in the rufous Orang-Outang, the 

 greater length of the arm forbid that supposition, and we must 

 conclude with believing if it be not a very incorrect delineation of the 

 white Lar, or what is far more difficult to conceive, a white lusus of 

 the Black Orang-Outang of Africa, (with which its more moderate 



* This we have determined from the skeleton in the Museum of the 

 College of Surgeons, the particulars of which will appear hereafter 



