Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 28.djvu/772

752 lose portions of their tails of toes, but it also occurs among orang-outangs in their wild state. The middle toe is the longest, and the fourth toe is the shortest. Layers of fat may be observed on the under side of all but the great-toe, where they rarely occur. The backs of the hands and feet are covered with very ribbed and wrinkled skin, and on the hands there are callosities.

This animal, of a quieter and more phlegmatic disposition than the gorilla and chimpanzee, has a very strange appearance, with its projecting head and short neck; its face widening in the middle and tapering toward the forehead and chin; its tun-shaped trunk, long, thin extremities, and shaggy coat. It differs widely from the chimpanzee and gorilla in these particulars. In the young male the compression of the forehead is less marked than in aged animals, and the bony crests which conduce to raise the coronal arch in its upper and hinder part are also absent. The supraorbital arches are less strongly developed, the jaws are less prominent, and the layers of fat upon the cheeks are absent. The head is more detached from the neck, the structure of the whole body is slenderer, the expression of the countenance is milder. A small, conical nail, blunted at the end, may generally be observed on the great-toe.

In the adult female, as I have pointed out elsewhere, the physical characteristics of the young male are repeated in an exaggerated form. The skull, displaying only very small bony crests, is indeed high, but more rounded than in the aged male; the face is prominent, but the head is more detached from the neck than in the latter case. On account of the greater width of the pelvis, the body is still more tun-shaped than in the aged male. When giving suck, the breasts are distended in the form of a half cone, but when this condition ceases they fall together and only present two short, wrinkled, slightly prominent folds of skin; the small, horny nipples are almost cylindrical; and the areola, of which the traces are scanty at all times, altogether disappears. The throat-pouch is less strongly developed than in the aged male, but the limbs are as fully developed. The head of the young female is still more rounded, with a more flattened though still projecting face, and the limbs are slenderer, and thus still more out of proportion with the thick trunk than is the case with a young male.

The orang-outang's skin is of a grayish-blue color, sometimes mixed with brown, but the grayish-blue shade is predominant. A yellowish or brownish gray is less common. Round the eyes, nostrils, upper lips, and chin, there is often a ring of a dirty, yellowish-brown color, forming a strange contrast with the general bluish-gray tone of the face. The arms, legs, hands, and feet are black or grayish-black, more rarely brown or reddish-brown.

The hairy coat of the orang-outang consists of long, curved, waving bristles, and some scanty downy hairs. On the back of the head, on the shoulders, back, and hips, I have measured hairs from two hundred