78 
NATURAL HISTORY. 
each other from different parts of the jungle. After nine or ten o’clock they begin to think of eatings 
and are soon engaged in feeding on fruit, young leaves, buds, shoots, and insects, for which they occa- 
sionally come to the ground. When approached, if alone, they will sit so close, doubled up in a thick 
tuft of foliage, or behind the fork of a tree, and so screened as to be safe from the shot of the sports- 
man. With a companion this manoeuvre is of course useless. But even when the creature is forced 
from its hiding-place it is not easily shot, for it swings from branch to branch with its long arms, 
shaking the boughs all round, and Hinging itself from prodigious heights into the dense under-scn b, 
and is quickly concealed from view. This long-armed Ape does not walk readily on its hind-legs, and 
has to stop frequently and prop or urge itself on, having the knuckles on the ground. In sitting it 
often rests on its elbows, and it likes to lie on its back. They make great use of their hind limbs, and 
of the hand-foot especially, for they will cling on and swing with their fore-hands, and steal and cany 
anything which pleases them with their hinder ones. In captivity it is generally a gentle, peaceable 
animal, very timid ; but when captured after its young days have passed, it becomes very wild. The 
adults soon die, and even the young seldom reach maturity when deprived of liberty. They are 
born generally in the early part of the cold weather, a single one at a time, two being as rare as 
human twins. The young one clings safely to the mother for about seven months, although she swings 
and climbs to perfection, and then it shifts for itself. They may be made cross, like most creatures, 
by being teased, and anger is then shown by a steady look, with the mouth held open, and the lips 
occasionally drawn back to show the eye teeth, with which they bite severely. But usually it attacks 
with its long hands, which are at such times held dangling and shaken in a ridiculous manner, like 
a person who has suddenly burnt his fingers. It drinks in a curious and difficult manner, by scooping 
the water in its long narrow hand, and thus conveying a very little drop at a time to its mouth. 
Usually the young are feeble, dull, and querulous in captivity, mid sit huddled up together on 
the ground, seldom or never climbing trees. On the smooth surface of a matted floor they will 
run along on their feet and slide on their hands at the same time. By being fed solely on plantains, 
or on milk and rice, they are apt to lose all their fur, presenting in their nude state a most ridiculous- 
appearance. Few recover ; but by change of diet, and especially by allowing them to help them- 
selves to insects, some of them come round, and resume their natural covering. For the most 
part they are devoid of those pranks and tricks which are exhibited by the smaller Monkeys. The 
length of a full-grown male was two feet six inches ; the fore limb measured two feet one inch, and 
the hind limb one foot seven and a half inches. The Lar or White-handed Gibbon has a black skin 
and hair, and there is a white band round the entire face, across the forehead. 
The Lar is common in its native haunts, and is subject to great variation in its colour. Some 
are dark brown or black, with white hands and feet, and they have the circle of white hairs around the 
face, the band across the forehead coming down in a peak above the nose. Others are ochre-brown,, 
and have a lighter-coloured hand, foot, and anklet ; whilst many are a dirty white. They take odd 
fancies, and likes and dislikes. Some which are allowed in India to roam about the grounds of the 
Zoological Gardens there will come in to sleep, and are exceedingly gentle to men, but extremely 
savage to women ; others do not do this. 
In looking at the co lection in the British Museum, every one must be struck with the long necks 
of these creatures, which do not allow the little muzzle and snub-like nose to come down on a level with 
the breast-bone (as in the Chimpanzee, for instance), and also with the extremely narrow and long 
hands and feet, with their thin fingers. It will be also noticed that the nails of their thumbs and 
toe-thumbs are flat, whilst all the rest are claws. Their chin is less prominent than that of the 
Siamang, and this is shown in the skull. In the lower jaw there are some interesting differences 
between the Lar and the Siamang which cannot readily be accounted for; firstly, the crushing teeth wear 
in pits in the middle, whilst a ridge is formed in the Siamang ; and in the Lar the angle of the jaw is 
decidedly turned in or inflected, as the term is, a condition which will be noticed in the other Hylobates. 
No air or laryngeal sac is found in the Lar or in any Gibbon, and its noise has therefore nothing 
to do with such an organ. 
Their swinging from branch to branch is assisted by the same arrangement of the muscle of the 
arm as in the Siamang : and they have the transversus pedis, which was stated to be wanting in the 
Orang, and it is united with the adductor of the thumb. 
