66 
PRIMROSE : THE ANATOMY OF THE ORANG OUTANG 
similar attachments in the fourth toe to those described for the short 
flexor in the third toe. The tendinous slip for the fifth toe was 
extremely delicate, and was joined by a slip (which seemed to be wholly 
tendinous) from the flexor digitorum tibialis of similar character and 
connections as that described for the fourth toe. It will be observed 
that the flexor digitorum fibularis gave no tendon for the hallux. 
It would appear that the distribution of the flexor digitorum fibularis 
to the third and fourth toes is very constant, occurring, according to 
Bischoff, in all apes,^ and further in all apes save the Orang, according 
to the same authority, a tendon is given by this muscle to the great toe. 
but this tendon is extremely weak, excepting in the Gorilla, where Bis- 
chofif states that a very strong tendon to the hallux is found.^ Duver- 
noy^ describes and figures the flexor longus hallucis in the Gorilla as 
giving a very powerful tendon to the great toe, and also supplying the 
third and fourth toes. The tendon to the hallux fails utterly in the 
Orang. In Huxley’s Gibbon,^ the flexor digitorum fibularis was dis- 
tributed to the first, second, third and fourth digits, and the flexor 
digitorum tibialis was supplied to the fifth digit only. 
There can be no doubt that the flexor longus fibularis represents the 
flexor longus hallucis in man, and the flexor longus tibialis the flexor 
longus digitorum in man. Dobson® has traced the homologies of the 
long flexor muscles of the foot throughout the mammalia. In the 
human subject Turner® has shown that there is frequent communica- 
tion in man of the flexor longus hallucis with the flexor tendons of the 
four outer toes. Thus, in fifty specimens dissected, he found that in 
eleven cases such a communication existed with the second toe only ; in 
twenty cases, with the second and third toes, and in eighteen, with the 
second, third and fourth toes, whilst, in one specimen, there was a com- 
munication with the four outer toes. Schulze^ gives somewhat similar 
results, but has not observed a communication with the fifth toe. 
Huxley® observed a contribution to the flexor brevis digitorum from 
the flexor digitorum tibialis in the Gorilla, and in the Orang he also 
1 Loc. cit. I, p. 232. 
2 Loc. cit. 2, p. 30. 
3 Loc. cit. p. II2. 
4 Loc. cit., Vol. I, p. 648. 
5 G. E. Dobson, “ On the Homologies of the Long Flexor Muscles of the Feet of Mammalia, with 
Remarks on the Value of their Leading Modifications in Classification.” Journ. of Anat. and Phys., Vol. 
XVI I, 1883, p. 142. 
6 Loc. cit., p. 181. 
7 Loc. cit., p. I. 
8 Loc. cit., Vol. I, pp. 538, 596. 
