THE FIVE APES, OR MEN OF THE WOODS
One day it came to pass that strange-looking apes, called by the human
beings of the forest “men of the woods,” came to the same part of the
forest to find food. They are called “men of the woods” because their
resemblance to human beings is striking. They are very ugly, but they
themselves think they are very good looking,—in fact, the handsomest
creatures in the forest.
These men of the woods live in the deepest and gloomiest part of the
great forest, for they shun open places and the presence of human
beings, with their noise. The different species or varieties are called
nginas, nshiegos, mbouvés, nkengos, kooloo-kambas. Every one of these
has a language of its own, distinct from the others.
Their ancestors, like themselves, were born in the forest and lived in
it,—in a word, the men of the woods had lived there for numberless ages,
thousands and thousands of years ago. The reason they live in the great
forest, and cannot live in any other part of the land, is because they
subsist on fruit, berries, nuts, canes, and saplings, and these are
found all the year round, for it is always warm in the country, and the
fruit-bearing trees are very abundant.
These men of the woods never kill creatures to eat. They roam from one
place to another in order to procure a living, and the amount of food
consumed in a day is very great. They have the same gifts as the other
animals. Having a good memory, they know their way through the forest
and dense jungle, and the seasons of the year when the fruits are ripe
at such and such a place.
The male ngina is the most powerful of all the men of the woods. He is
called the Giant, the Powerful. He can conquer every other ape. His
strength is so great that no one of them dares to attack him. When
suddenly surprised, he attacks human beings, and with terrible muscular
arms and with open hand he kills them by a single blow. His strength is
that of about twelve strong men together.
He is blacker than soot, and his children are born as black as he is. A
big ngina weighs from three to four hundred pounds. He is all bones,
sinews, and muscles. His body is covered with hair not very thick, and
his skin is almost as thick as that of an ox. He is from five to six
feet in height.
The nshiego or mbouvé averages from about three feet ten inches to four
feet four inches in height, and is in many respects a stranger creature
than the ngina. He is smaller and far from being as strong, but
nevertheless, in a hand-to-hand fight with a man, the latter would not
have the slightest chance, and would be torn to pieces. Man without
weapons is very weak and helpless, but the mbouvé never attacks man, but
flies at his approach.
The nshiego mbouvé is bald-headed when adult, and very black, with a
body thinly covered with hair. But a wonderful thing is that though the
parents are very black, the children are born perfectly white. As the
young mbouvé grows older his complexion gradually changes, the white
color gradually tanning, and then becoming darker and darker until
finally black patches show themselves on the face, and at last he
becomes entirely black and of the color of his parents.
The nkengo is born tan yellow, of the color of his parents, and remains
so to the end of his days. He also has no rosy cheeks and never blushes
or becomes red in the face, no matter how enraged he becomes. His
complexion is very much like that of the Moors, or of the people who lie
on the sands all summer on the seashore. He attains sometimes a height
of four feet and a half, and is very strong.
The nshiego, or the common chimpanzee, is born yellow, but gradually
turns very black like his parents. He is about the same size as the
nshiego mbouvé.
The kooloo-kamba is born black and remains so all his life. He is a
strong-looking creature. He has an almost round head, prominent
cheek-bones, large ears (a characteristic of all the men of the woods),
and is about the size of the nkengo.
The nshiegos, the mbouvés, the nkengos, the kooloo-kambas have long
arms, big ears, elongated hands and feet, and long fingers, thus showing
that a great part of their lives is spent upon trees.
The nginas, on the contrary, have very small ears, broad, powerful, and
short hands, short fingers, thick, broad, short feet of great strength
and power for grasping, and have shorter arms than all the other apes.
All the apes use their feet as hands.
The mbouvés and the nkengos are the two most intelligent of the men of
the woods. They are the only ones that build bowers on the trees, so
that they can say they have a home.
The ngina is by far the fiercest of all the apes, and builds no shelter
of any kind whatever, and he is such a huge feeder that he has to roam
through the forest more than all the other apes.