3 6 
APES AND MONKEYS, 
also known under the names of Jina, N’Jina, or Indjina, or N’Guyala, while by 
Europeans it is universally termed the Gorilla. The naturalist Button appears to 
have given credence to Battel’s pongo (N’Pungu, or M’Pungu, as it is variously 
spelt); but his account was summarily rejected by the great Cuvier as a mere 
traveller’s tale. Still, however, vague rumours of the existence on the West Coast 
of Africa of an ape of larger size and fiercer habits than the chimpanzee from 
time to time reached Europe; and in 1819 Bowdich, in his account of the “ Mission 
from Cape Coast Castle to Ashanti,” definitely stated that among the many curious 
apes found in the Gabun district the ingenu (or gorilla) was by far the largest 
and strongest. It was not, however, till the year 1847 that any precise evidence 
of the existence of this mysterious ape reached Europe. In that year, however, 
Dr. Savage, an English missionary stationed at the Gabun, wrote to the veteran 
comparative anatomist, Sir Bichard Owen, enclosing drawings of the skull of an 
ape from that district, which was described as being much larger than the 
chimpanzee, and feared by the negroes more than they dread the lion, or any 
other wild beast of the forest. These sketches clearly showed the bold bony crests 
over the eye-sockets, which mark the skull of the gorilla as distinct from that of 
the chimpanzee. “ At a later date in the same year,” writes Sir Richard Owen, 
,£ were transmitted to me from Bristol two skulls of the same large species of 
chimpanzee as that notified in Dr. Savage’s letter; they were obtained from the 
same locality in Africa, and brought clearly to light evidence of the existence in 
Africa of a second larger and more powerful ape.” In the following year these 
specimens were described by the English anatomist under the name of Troglodytes 
savagei. It appears, however, that about the same time that Dr. Savage forwarded 
the sketches to Sir Richard Owen, he also sent a skull of the unknown ape, 
together with a description of the animal itself, by the hand of a fellow-missionary 
named Wilson, to Boston in the United States. And in an American scientific 
journal for the year 1847, the new ape was described, and named Troglodytes 
gorilla. Thus matters stood till the year 1851, when a Captain Harris presented 
to the Royal College of Surgeons the first skeleton of a gorilla that had ever 
been brought to England; while in the same year another skeleton was sent to 
Philadelphia by Mr. Ford. This at once made a great advance in our knowledge 
of the creature; and in 1852 a French naturalist came to the conclusion that the 
gorilla ought not to be included in the same genus as the chimpanzee; and he 
accordingly proposed for it the name of Gorilla gena. By the rules of nomenclature 
adopted among zoologists, he had, however, no right to supersede the specific 
name proposed by Sir Richard Owen; and the gorilla is accordingly now known 
scientifically as Gorilla savagei. 
In 1856 the well-known African traveller, Du Chaillu, arrived at the Gabun, 
preparatory to his expedition into the interior; and two years later the British 
Museum received from the Gabun an entire gorilla preserved in spirits, the skin 
of which was soon afterwards mounted and exhibited to the public. 
Such is the history of the gradual acquisition of our knowledge of the largest 
of the apes. On his return from the Gabun to America, Du Chaillu set to work 
to publish an account of his travels and adventures; and in 1861 the world was 
startled by the appearance of his Explorations and Adventures in Equatorial 
