FRONT AND SIDE FACE OF THE ORANG.
The following description from the same author gives an excellent idea of the nature of the country inhabited by another Orang, and of its Monkey companions:—
“After a few miles, the stream became very narrow and winding, and the whole country on each side was flooded. On the banks were abundance of Monkeys—the common Macacus cynomolgus, a black Semnopithecus, and the extraordinary Long-nosed Monkey (Nasalis larvatus), which is as large as a three-year-old child, has a very long tail, and a fleshy nose, longer than that of the biggest-nosed man. The further we went on the narrower and more winding the stream became; fallen trees sometimes blocked up our passage, and sometimes tangled branches and creepers met completely across it, and had to be cut away before we could get on. It took us two days to reach Semábanga, and we hardly saw a bit of dry land all the way. In the latter part of the journey I could touch the bushes on each side for miles; and we were often delayed by the screw-pines (Pandanus) which grew abundantly in the water, falling across the stream. In other places dense rafts of floating grass completely filled up the channel, making our journey a constant succession of difficulties. The mountain or hill was close by, covered with a complete forest of fruit-trees, among which the Durion and Mangosteen were very abundant; but the fruit was not yet quite ripe, except a little here and there. I spent a week at this place, going out every day in various directions about the mountain, accompanied by a Malay, who had stayed with me while the other boatmen returned. For three days we found no Orangs, but shot a Deer and several Monkeys. On the fourth day, however, we found a Mias feeding on a very lofty Durion tree, and succeeded in killing it, after eight shots. Unfortunately it remained in the tree, hanging by its hands, and we were obliged to leave it and return home, as it was several miles off. As I felt pretty sure it would fall during the night, I returned to the place early the next morning, and found it on the ground beneath the tree. To my astonishment and pleasure, it appeared to be a different kind from any I had yet seen; for although a full-grown male, by its fully-developed teeth and very large canines, it had no sign of the lateral protuberance on the face, and was about one-tenth smaller than the other adult males. The upper incisors, however, appeared to be broader than in the larger species, a character distinguishing the Simia morio of Professor Owen, which he has described from the skull of a female specimen. As it was too far to carry the animal home, I set to work and skinned the body on the spot, leaving the head, hands, and feet attached, to be finished at home. This specimen is now in the British Museum.”
The Mias, as stated by Rajah Brooke, will turn upon an antagonist when hard pressed, and with no small bravery and ferocity; and this was satisfactorily proved by Mr. Wallace, who tells the following story:—
“About ten days after this, on June 4th, some Dyaks came to tell me that the day before a Mias had nearly killed one of their companions. A few miles down the river there is a Dyak house, and the inhabitants saw a large Orang feeding on the young shoots of a palm by the river side. On being alarmed he retreated towards the jungle, which was close by, and a number of the men, armed with spears and choppers, ran out to intercept him. The man who was in front tried to run his spear through the animal’s body, but the Mias seized it in his hands, and in an instant got hold of the man’s arm, which he seized in his mouth, making his teeth meet in the flesh above the elbow, which he tore and lacerated in a dreadful manner. Had not the others been close behind, the man would have been more seriously injured, if not killed, as he was quite powerless; but they soon destroyed the creature with their spears and choppers. The man remained ill for a long time, and never fully recovered the use of his arm. They told me the dead Mias was still lying where it had been killed, so I offered them a reward to bring it up to our landing-place immediately, which they promised to do. They did not come, however, till the next day, and then decomposition had commenced, and great patches of the hair came off, so that it was useless to skin it. This I regretted much, as it was a very fine, full-grown male. I cut off the head and took it home to clean, while I got my men to make a close fence, about five feet high, round the rest of the body, which would soon be devoured by maggots, small lizards, and ants, leaving me the skeleton.”
On another occasion Mr. Wallace had an opportunity of observing the nest, or rather nest-making, which is performed by these animals when severely wounded. “He was called by a Chinaman working in Borneo to shoot a Mias which, he said, was on a tree close by his house at the coal-mines. Arriving at the place, we had some difficulty in finding the animal, as he had gone off into the jungle, which was very rocky and difficult to traverse. At last we found him up a very high tree, and could see that he was a male of the largest size. As soon as I had fired, he moved higher up the tree, and while he was doing so I fired again; and we then saw that one arm was broken. He had now reached the very highest part of an immense tree, and immediately began breaking off boughs all around, and laying them across and across to make a nest. It was very interesting to see how well he had chosen his place, and how rapidly he stretched out his unwounded arm in every direction, breaking off good-sized boughs with the greatest ease, and laying them back across each other, so that in a few minutes he had formed a compact mass of foliage, which entirely concealed him from our sight. He was evidently going to pass the night here, and would probably get away early the next morning, if not wounded too severely. I therefore fired again several times, in hopes of making him leave his nest; but, though I felt sure I had hit him, as at each shot he moved a little, he would not go away. At length he raised himself up, so that half his body was visible, and then gradually sank down, his head alone remaining on the edge of the nest. I now felt sure he was dead, and tried to persuade the Chinaman and his companion to cut down the tree; but it was a very large one, and they had been at work all day, and nothing would induce them to attempt it. The next morning, at daybreak, I came to the place, and found that the Mias was evidently dead, as his head was visible in exactly the same position as before.”
There is every reason to believe that the Mias, or Orang-utan, is confined to the two great islands of Sumatra and Borneo, in the former of which, however, it seems to be much more rare. In Borneo it has a wide range, inhabiting many districts on the south-west, south-east, north-east, and north-west coasts, but appears to be chiefly confined to the low and swampy forests. It seems, at first sight, very inexplicable that the Mias should be quite unknown in the Saráwak valley, while it is abundant in Sambas, on the west, and Sádong, on the east; but when we know the habits and mode of life of the animal, we see a sufficient reason for this apparent anomaly in the physical features of the Saráwak district. Where Mr. Wallace observed the Mias it was where the country is low, level, and swampy, and at the same time covered with a lofty virgin forest. Many isolated mountains, on some of which the Dyaks have settled, are close by, and are covered with plantations of fruit-trees. These are a great attraction to the Mias, which comes to feed on the fruits, but always retires to the swamp at night. When the country becomes slightly elevated, and the soil dry, the Mias is no longer to be found. For example, in all the lower parts of the Sádong valley it abounds, but as soon as we ascend above the limits of the tides, where the country, though still flat, is high enough to be dry, it disappears. Now, the Saráwak valley has this peculiarity: the lower portion, though swampy, is not covered with continuous lofty forests, but is principally occupied by the Nipa palm; and near the town of Saráwak, where the country becomes dry, it is greatly undulated in many parts, and covered with small patches of virgin forest and much second-growth jungle, on ground which has once been cultivated by the Malays or Dyaks. “Now it seems to me,” writes the same author, “that a wide extent of unbroken and equally lofty virgin forest is necessary to the comfortable existence of these animals. Such forests form their open country, where they can roam in every direction, with as much facility as the Indian on the prairie or the Arab on the desert; passing from tree-top to tree-top without ever being obliged to descend upon the earth. The elevated and the drier districts are more frequented by man, and are more cut up by clearings and low second-growth jungle. They are not adapted to its peculiar mode of progression, and they would be more exposed to danger, and more frequently obliged to descend upon the earth in such places. There is probably also a greater variety of fruit in the Mias district, the small mountains which rise like islands out of it serving as a sort of gardens or plantations. It is a singular and very interesting sight to watch a Mias making his way leisurely through the forest. He walks deliberately along some of the larger branches in the semi-erect attitude, which the great length of his arms and the shortness of his legs cause him naturally to assume; and the disproportion between these limbs is increased by his walking on his knuckles, not on the palm of the hand, as we should do. He seems always to choose those branches which intermingle with an adjoining tree, on approaching which he stretches out his long arms, and seizing the opposing boughs, grasps them together with both hands, seems to try their strength, and then deliberately swings himself across to the next branch on which he walks along as before. He never jumps or springs, or even appears to hurry himself, and yet manages to get along almost as quickly as a person can run through the forest beneath. The long and powerful arms are of the greatest use to the animal, enabling it to climb easily up the loftiest trees, to seize fruits and young leaves from slender boughs which will not bear its weight, and to gather leaves and branches with which to form its nest.”
