The Lar is common in its native haunts, and is subject to great variation in its colour. Some are dark brown or black, with white hands and feet, and they have the circle of white hairs around the face, the band across the forehead coming down in a peak above the nose. Others are ochre-brown, and have a lighter-coloured hand, foot, and anklet; whilst many are a dirty white. They take odd fancies, and likes and dislikes. Some which are allowed in India to roam about the grounds of the Zoological Gardens there will come in to sleep, and are exceedingly gentle to men, but extremely savage to women; others do not do this.
In looking at the collection in the British Museum, every one must be struck with the long necks of these creatures, which do not allow the little muzzle and snub-like nose to come down on a level with the breast-bone (as in the Chimpanzee, for instance), and also with the extremely narrow and long hands and feet, with their thin fingers. It will be also noticed that the nails of their thumbs and toe-thumbs are flat, whilst all the rest are claws. Their chin is less prominent than that of the Siamang, and this is shown in the skull. In the lower jaw there are some interesting differences between the Lar and the Siamang which cannot readily be accounted for; firstly, the crushing teeth wear in pits in the middle, whilst a ridge is formed in the Siamang; and in the Lar the angle of the jaw is decidedly turned in or inflected, as the term is, a condition which will be noticed in the other Hylobates.
No air or laryngeal sac is found in the Lar or in any Gibbon, and its noise has therefore nothing to do with such an organ.
Their swinging from branch to branch is assisted by the same arrangement of the muscle of the arm as in the Siamang; and they have the transversus pedis, which was stated to be wanting in the Orang, and it is united with the adductor of the thumb.
THE HOOLOOK.[22]
Naturalists have ransacked nearly every part of the globe for interesting animals, and have procured them from very out-of-the-way places. One of these localities was particularly difficult to get at years ago, for it is in the hills, far away to the north-east of Calcutta the other side of the great river Brahmapootra, in Assam. Amongst the Garrow and Cossyah hills, where there are wild gorges, and uplands crowded with vast forests, overlooking the wide plains of the river-valley, there were many wonderfully active Gibbons. About two feet in length, they were capable of swinging with unerring certainty from branch to branch, many feet apart; and even the females performed these constant and natural movements while their young were hanging to them. They were black in colour, with white eyebrows, or, rather, a white band across the forehead. When caught, they soon became tamed, especially when young, and were docile and affectionate. One which was kept by Dr. Burrough was two feet six inches in length, yet the fore-limb was only five inches shorter than this, the length of the hand itself being six inches.
SKULL OF HOOLOOK.
So great was the disproportion of the legs and arms, that the first were, including the feet, only nineteen inches long, and the fingers touched the ground readily when he was standing erect. This Hoolook was of a deep black colour, and he had the usual simple band of white across the forehead, and black hands and feet. He was caught in the usual haunt of this species, not on the upper, but on the lower hills, which do not reach a greater altitude than 500 feet, and being well treated, he was easily tamed, and his habits were capable of being well watched. He liked the fruit of the peepul-tree better than anything, and bananas; but he took to rice and milk, and enjoyed snapping up a sweet or two, and especially delighted in Spiders. Meat he cared little about, and pork and beef he detested, but he liked fish occasionally. After about a month’s captivity he took a great fancy to his master, and would come to his call, and sit up to breakfast. He liked to help himself to chicken and egg, and at first was very bad in his manners, dipping his fingers into the coffee and milk, and then sucking them. Afterwards he was taught to hold a cup and to drink from it.