An introduction to the study of the anthropoid apes / by Arthur Keith.

  • Arthur Keith
Date:
1897
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: An introduction to the study of the anthropoid apes / by Arthur Keith. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    this aspect of the gorilla, so that a great part of literature is devoted to these more superficial and accessible characters. Very good figures of the gorilla are given by Hartmann (40), by Wolff (Proc. Zool. Soc., 1877), Bolau (10), Chapman (13), Deniker (17), Du Chaillu (21), Falkenstein (25), Lenz (53), Meyer (58), and Owen (66). The ear has been figured by Deniker, Ehlers, Bischoff, Hartmann, Owen, Lenz, and Bolau. The hands and feet have been dealt with by Hepburn (46), Chapman, Hartmann, Deniker, Bolau, Owen, Huxley (49a), Lucae (54), and Hermes [47]. There was a silly question once raised whether the lower extremities were furnished with hands or feet; an index to the literature on the question is obtainable from Huxley’s and Lucae’s articles. The hair and its changes with age, as well as the pigment of the skin, and the method of its appearance and manner in which it is deposited and spread over the body, require some more observation, notwithstanding the elaborate descriptions of Lenz (53), Alix (2), Bischoff (7), Bolau (10), Chapman (13), Deniker (17), Du Chaillu (21), Ehlers (23), Famelart (26), Hartmann (40), Hermes (47,), Meyer (58), Owen (66), Savage (71), and Wyman (87). Measurements are given by Bischoff, Hartmann, Bolau, Hermes, Deniker, Meyer, Owen, Chapman, Huxley (49a), and many others, but the subject and records are both alike unsatisfactory. [See also 89, 150 and 163.] Psychology.—The intellectual and emotional characters of the gorilla have not been studied so much as even the few opportunities have allowed. Hermes gives the best description of its habits in captivity, and our knowledge of its habits in its native haunts is due for the most part to Du Chaillu. For the great amount of material, and the knowledge of the gorilla which he brought home, Du Chaillu had little in return but malaria, quinine, and scientific abuse, so that we need hardly be astonished that he has not pursued the subject further. The best resume of the habits of the gorilla is still that by Huxley (49a), although further information may be picked from the accounts of Falkenstein (25), Famelart (26), Franquet (30), Ford (29), Hartmann (43), Laboullay (51), de Langle (52), Reade (68), Reading (69), Savage (71), and Walker (86). Distribution.—The gorilla is confined to the French and German territories north of the Congo: see Hartmann (43), Savage (71), Reade (68), Reading (69), Ford (29), St. Hilaire (72), and Famelart (26). The extent of its distribution eastwards is unknown. Classification.—Of all the literature on the gorilla this part of it is most marked by incompetence and prejudice. Luckily, Savage, the scientific discoverer of the gorilla, had Wyman to advise him, and they named it Troglodytes gorilla—regarding it as a large, sensual and ferocious form of chimpanzee. That seems to me the true and permanent scientific name and estimation of the gorilla. Duvernoy, however, called it Gorilla tschego [No! see p. 23], Is. Geof. St. Hilaire gave the name Gorilla gina, and over the gorilla’s cage at the Zoological