Ancient traditions, when tested by the severe processes of modern
investigation, commonly enough fade away into mere dreams: but it is
singular how often the dream turns out to have been a half-waking one,
presaging a reality. Ovid foreshadowed the discoveries of the geologist:
the Atlantis was an imagination, but Columbus found a western world: and
though the quaint forms of Centaurs and Satyrs have an existence only
in the realms of art, creatures approaching man more nearly than they
in essential structure, and yet as thoroughly brutal as the goat's
or horse's half of the mythical compound, are now not only known, but
notorious.
I have not met with any notice of one of these MAN-LIKE APES of earlier
date than that contained in Pigafetta's 'Description of the Kingdom of
Congo,'* drawn up from the notes of a Portuguese sailor, Eduardo Lopez,
and published in 1598. The tenth chapter of this work is entitled "De
Animalibus quae in hac provincia reperiuntur," and contains a brief
passage to the effect that "in the Songan country, on the banks of the
Zaire, there are multitudes of apes, which afford great delight to the
nobles by imitating human gestures." As this might apply to almost any
kind of apes, I should have thought little of it, had not the brothers
De Bry, whose engravings illustrate the work, thought fit, in their
eleventh 'Argumentum,' to figure two of these "Simiae magnatum
deliciae." So much of the plate as contains these apes is faithfully
copied in the woodcut (Figure 1), and it will be observed that they
are tail-less, long-armed, and large-eared; and about the size of
Chimpanzees. It may be that these apes are as much figments of the
imagination of the ingenious brothers as the winged, two-legged,
crocodile-headed dragon which adorns the same plate; or, on the other
hand, it may be that the artists have constructed their drawings from
some essentially faithful description of a Gorilla or a Chimpanzee. And,
in either case, though these figures are worth a passing notice, the
oldest trustworthy and definite accounts of any animal of this kind
date from the 17th century, and are due to an Englishman. ([Footnote] *
REGNUM CONGO: hoc est VERA DESCRIPTIO REGNI AFRICANI QUOD TAM AB INCOLIS
QUAM LUSITANIS CONGUS APPELLATUR, per Philippum Pigafettam, olim ex
Edoardo Lopez acroamatis lingua Italica excerpta, num Latio sermone
donata ab August. Cassiod. Reinio. Iconibus et imaginibus rerum
memorabilium quasi vivis, opera et industria Joan. Theodori et Joan.
Israelis de Bry, fratrum exornata. Francofurti, MDXCVIII.)
(FIGURE 1.--SIMIAE MAGNATUM DELICIAE.--De Bry, 1598.)
The first edition of that most amusing old book, 'Purchas his
Pilgrimage,' was published in 1613, and therein are to be found many
references to the statements of one whom Purchas terms "Andrew Battell
(my neere neighbour, dwelling at Leigh in Essex) who served under Manuel
Silvera Perera, Governor under the King of Spaine, at his city of Saint
Paul, and with him went farre into the countrey of Angola"; and again,
"my friend, Andrew Battle, who lived in the kingdom of Congo many
yeares," and who, "upon some quarell betwixt the Portugals (among whom
he was a sergeant of a band) and him, lived eight or nine moneths in
the woodes." From this weather-beaten old soldier, Purchas was amazed
to hear "of a kinde of Great Apes, if they might so bee termed, of the
height of a man, but twice as bigge in feature of their limmes, with
strength proportionable, hairie all over, otherwise altogether like men
and women in their whole bodily shape.* They lived on such wilde fruits
as the trees and woods yielded, and in the night time lodged on
the trees." ([Footnote] *"Except this that their legges had no
calves."--[Ed. 1626.] And in a marginal note, "These great apes are
called Pongo's.")
This extract is, however, less detailed and clear in its statements
than a passage in the third chapter of the second part of another
work--'Purchas his Pilgrimes,' published in 1625, by the same
author--which has been often, though hardly ever quite rightly, cited.
The chapter is entitled, "The strange adventures of Andrew Battell,
of Leigh in Essex, sent by the Portugals prisoner to Angola, who lived
there and in the adjoining regions neere eighteene yeeres." And the
sixth section of this chapter is headed--"Of the Provinces of Bongo,
Calongo, Mayombe, Manikesocke, Motimbas: of the Ape Monster Pongo, their
hunting: Idolatries; and divers other observations."
"This province (Calongo) toward the east bordereth upon Bongo, and
toward the north upon Mayombe, which is nineteen leagues from Longo
along the coast.
"This province of Mayombe is all woods and groves, so over-growne that
a man may travaile twentie days in the shadow without any sunne or heat.
Here is no kind of corne nor graine, so that the people liveth onely
upon plantanes and roots of sundrie sorts, very good; and nuts; nor any
kinde of tame cattell, nor hens.
"But they have great store of elephant's flesh, which they greatly
esteeme, and many kinds of wild beasts; and great store of fish. Here is
a great sandy bay, two leagues to the northward of Cape Negro,* which
is the port of Mayombe. ([Footnote] *Purchas' note.--Cape Negro is in 16
degrees south of the line.) Sometimes the Portugals lade logwood in
this bay. Here is a great river, called Banna: in the winter it hath no
barre, because the generall winds cause a great sea. But when the sunne
hath his south declination, then a boat may goe in; for then it is
smooth because of the raine. This river is very great, and hath many
ilands and people dwelling in them. The woods are so covered with
baboones, monkies, apes and parrots, that it will feare any man to
travaile in them alone. Here are also two kinds of monsters, which are
common in these woods, and very dangerous.
"The greatest of these two monsters is called Pongo in their language,
and the lesser is called Engeco. This Pongo is in all proportion like a
man; but that he is more like a giant in stature than a man; for he is
very tall, and hath a man's face, hollow-eyed, with long haire upon his
browes. His face and eares are without haire, and his hands also. His
bodie is full of haire, but not very thicke; and it is of a dunnish
colour.
"He differeth not from a man but in his legs; for they have no calfe.
Hee goeth alwaies upon his legs, and carrieth his hands clasped in the
nape of his necke when he goeth upon the ground. They sleepe in the
trees, and build shelters for the raine. They feed upon fruit that they
find in the woods, and upon nuts, for they eate no kind of flesh. They
cannot speake, and have no understanding more than a beast. The people
of the countrie, when they travaile in the woods make fires where they
sleepe in the night; and in the morning when they are gone, the Pongoes
will come and sit about the fire till it goeth out; for they have no
understanding to lay the wood together. They goe many together and kill
many negroes that travaile in the woods. Many times they fall upon the
elephants which come to feed where they be, and so beate them with their
clubbed fists, and pieces of wood, that they will runne roaring away
from them. Those Pongoes are never taken alive because they are so
strong, that ten men cannot hold one of them; but yet they take many of
their young ones with poisoned arrowes.
"The young Pongo hangeth on his mother's belly with his hands fast
clasped about her, so that when the countrie people kill any of the
females they take the young one, which hangeth fast upon his mother.
"When they die among themselves, they cover the dead with great heaps
of boughs and wood, which is commonly found in the forest."* ([Footnote]
*Purchas' marginal note, p. 982:--"The Pongo a giant ape. He told me in
conference with him, that one of these pongoes tooke a negro boy of
his which lived a moneth with them. For they hurt not those which they
surprise at unawares, except they look on them; which he avoyded. He
said their highth was like a man's, but their bignesse twice as great. I
saw the negro boy. What the other monster should be he hath forgotten
to relate; and these papers came to my hand since his death, which,
otherwise, in my often conferences, I might have learned. Perhaps he
meaneth the Pigmy Pongo killers mentioned.")
It does not appear difficult to identify the exact region of which
Battell speaks. Longo is doubtless the name of the place usually spelled
Loango on our maps. Mayombe still lies some nineteen leagues northward
from Loango, along the coast; and Cilongo or Kilonga, Manikesocke, and
Motimbas are yet registered by geographers. The Cape Negro of Battell,
however, cannot be the modern Cape Negro in 16 degrees S., since Loango
itself is in 4 degrees S. latitude. On the other hand, the "great river
called Banna" corresponds very well with the "Camma" and "Fernand Vas,"
of modern geographers, which form a great delta on this part of the
African coast.
Now this "Camma" country is situated about a degree and a-half south of
the Equator, while a few miles to the north of the line lies the Gaboon,
and a degree or so north of that, the Money River--both well known to
modern naturalists as localities where the largest of man-like Apes
has been obtained. Moreover, at the present day, the word Engeco, or
N'schego, is applied by the natives of these regions to the smaller of
the two great Apes which inhabit them; so that there can be no rational
doubt that Andrew Battell spoke of that which he knew of his own
knowledge, or, at any rate, by immediate report from the natives of
Western Africa. The "Engeco," however, is that "other monster" whose
nature Battell "forgot to relate," while the name "Pongo"--applied
to the animal whose characters and habits are so fully and carefully
described--seems to have died out, at least in its primitive form and
signification. Indeed, there is evidence that not only in Battell's
time, but up to a very recent date, it was used in a totally different
sense from that in which he employs it.
For example, the second chapter of Purchas' work, which I have just
quoted, contains "A Description and Historicall Declaration of the
Golden Kingdom of Guinea, etc. etc. Translated from the Dutch, and
compared also with the Latin," wherein it is stated (p. 986) that--"The
River Gaboon lyeth about fifteen miles northward from Rio de Angra, and
eight miles northward from Cape de Lope Gonsalves (Cape Lopez), and is
right under the Equinoctial line, about fifteene miles from St. Thomas,
and is a great land, well and easily to be knowne. At the mouth of
the river there lieth a sand, three or foure fathoms deepe, whereon it
beateth mightily with the streame which runneth out of the river into
the sea. This river, in the mouth thereof, is at least four miles broad;
but when you are about the Iland called 'Pongo', it is not above two
miles broad...On both sides the river there standeth many trees...The
Iland called 'Pongo', which hath a monstrous high hill."
(FIGURE 2.--"Homo Sylvestris. Orang Outang." The Orang of Tulpius,
1641.)
The French naval officers, whose letters are appended to the late
M. Isidore Geoff. Saint Hilaire's excellent essay on the Gorilla,*
([Footnote] *'Archives du Museum', tome x.) note in similar terms the
width of the Gaboon, the trees that line its banks down to the water's
edge, and the strong current that sets out of it. They describe two
islands in its estuary;--one low, called Perroquet; the other high,
presenting three conical hills, called Coniquet; and one of them, M.
Franquet, expressly states that, formerly, the Chief of Coniquet was
called 'Meni-Pongo', meaning thereby Lord of 'Pongo'; and that the
'N'Pongues' (as, in agreement with Dr. Savage, he affirms the natives
call themselves) term the estuary of the Gaboon itself 'N'Pongo'.
It is so easy, in dealing with savages, to misunderstand their
applications of words to things, that one is at first inclined to
suspect Battell of having confounded the name of this region, where his
"greater monster" still abounds, with the name of the animal itself. But
he is so right about other matters (including the name of the "lesser
monster") that one is loth to suspect the old traveller of error; and,
on the other hand, we shall find that a voyager of a hundred years'
later date speaks of the name "Boggoe," as applied to a great Ape, by
the inhabitants of quite another part of Africa--Sierra Leone.
But I must leave this question to be settled by philologers and
travellers; and I should hardly have dwelt so long upon it except for
the curious part played by this word 'Pongo' in the later history of the
man-like Apes.
The generation which succeeded Battell saw the first of the man-like
Apes which was ever brought to Europe, or, at any rate, whose visit
found a historian. In the third book of Tulpius' 'Observationes
Medicae', published in 1641, the 56th chapter or section is devoted to
what he calls 'Satyrus indicus', "called by the Indians Orang-autang or
Man-of-the-Woods, and by the Africans Quoias Morrou." He gives a very
good figure, evidently from the life, of the specimen of this animal,
"nostra memoria ex Angola delatum," presented to Frederick Henry Prince
of Orange. Tulpius says it was as big as a child of three years old, and
as stout as one of six years: and that its back was covered with black
hair. It is plainly a young Chimpanzee.
In the meanwhile, the existence of other, Asiatic, man-like Apes became
known, but at first in a very mythical fashion. Thus Bontius (1658)
gives an altogether fabulous and ridiculous account and figure of an
animal which he calls "Orang-outang"; and though he says "vidi Ego cujus
effigiem hic exhibeo," the said effigies (see Figure 6 for Hoppius' copy
of it) is nothing but a very hairy woman of rather comely aspect, and
with proportions and feet wholly human. The judicious English anatomist,
Tyson, was justified in saying of this description by Bontius, "I
confess I do mistrust the whole representation."
It is to the last mentioned writer, and his coadjutor Cowper, that we
owe the first account of a man-like ape which has any pretensions
to scientific accuracy and completeness. The treatise entitled,
"'Orang-outang, sive Homo Sylvestris'; or the Anatomy of a Pygmie
compared with that of a 'Monkey', an 'Ape', and a 'Man'," published by
the Royal Society in 1699, is, indeed, a work of remarkable merit, and
has, in some respects, served as a model to subsequent inquirers. This
"Pygmie," Tyson tells us "was brought from Angola, in Africa; but was
first taken a great deal higher up the country"; its hair "was of a
coal-black colour and strait," and "when it went as a quadruped on all
four, 'twas awkwardly; not placing the palm of the hand flat to the
ground, but it walk'd upon its knuckles, as I observed it to do when
weak and had not strength enough to support its body."--"From the top
of the head to the heel of the foot, in a strait line, it measured
twenty-six inches."
(FIGURES 3 AND 4.--The 'Pygmie' reduced from Tyson's figures 1 and 2,
1699.)
These characters, even without Tyson's good figures (Figs. 3 and
4), would have been sufficient to prove his "Pygmie" to be a young
Chimpanzee. But the opportunity of examining the skeleton of the very
animal Tyson anatomised having most unexpectedly presented itself to
me, I am able to bear independent testimony to its being a veritable
'Troglodytes niger',* though still very young. Although fully
appreciating the resemblances between his Pygmie and Man, Tyson by no
means overlooked the differences between the two, and he concludes his
memoir by summing up first, the points in which "the Ourang-outang or
Pygmie more resembled a Man than Apes and Monkeys do," under forty-seven
distinct heads; and then giving, in thirty-four similar brief
paragraphs, the respects in which "the Ourang-outang or Pygmie differ'd
from a Man and resembled more the Ape and Monkey kind."
([Footnote] * I am indebted to Dr. Wright, of Cheltenham, whose
paleontological labours are so well known, for bringing this interesting
relic to my knowledge. Tyson's granddaughter, it appears, married Dr.
Allardyce, a physician of repute in Cheltenham, and brought, as part of
her dowry, the skeleton of the 'Pygmie.' Dr. Allardyce presented it to
the Cheltenham Museum, and, through the good offices of my friend Dr.
Wright, the authorities of the Museum have permitted me to borrow, what
is, perhaps its most remarkable ornament.
After a careful survey of the literature of the subject extant in
his time, our author arrives at the conclusion that his "Pygmie" is
identical neither with the Orangs of Tulpius and Bontius, nor with the
Quoias Morrou of Dapper (or rather of Tulpius), the Barris of d'Arcos,
nor with the Pongo of Battell; but that it is a species of ape probably
identical with the Pygmies of the Ancients, and, says Tyson, though it
"does so much resemble a 'Man' in many of its parts, more than any of
the ape kind, or any other 'animal' in the world, that I know of: yet by
no means do I look upon it as the product of a 'mixt' generation--'tis a
'Brute-Animal sui generis', and a particular 'species of Ape'."
The name of "Chimpanzee," by which one of the African Apes is now so
well known, appears to have come into use in the first half of the
eighteenth century, but the only important addition made, in that
period, to our acquaintance with the man-like apes of Africa is
contained in 'A New Voyage to Guinea', by William Smith, which bears the
date 1744.