Asia and the larger Malay Islands. These last are far less like man than the other three, one or other of which has at various times been claimed to be the most man-like of the apes and our nearest relations in the animal kingdom. The question of the degree of resemblance of these animals to ourselves is one of great interest, leading, as it does, to some important conclusions as to our origin and geological antiquity, and we will therefore briefly consider it.
If we compare the skeletons of the orang or chimpanzee with that of man, we find them to be a kind of distorted copy, every bone corresponding (with very few exceptions), but altered somewhat in size, proportions, and position. So great is this resemblance that it led Professor Owen to remark: "I cannot shut my eyes to the significance of that all-pervading similitude of structure—every tooth, every bone, strictly homologous—which makes the determination of the difference between Homo and Pithecus the anatomist's difficulty."
The actual differences in the skeletons of these apes and that of man—that is, differences dependent on the presence or absence of certain bones, and not on their form or position—have been enumerated by Mr. Mivart as follows:—(1) In the breast-bone consisting of but two bones, man agrees with the gibbons; the chimpanzee and gorilla having this part consisting of seven bones in a single series, while in the orang they are arranged in a double series of ten bones. (2) The normal number of the ribs in the orang and some gibbons is twelve pairs, as in man, while in the chimpanzee and gorilla there are thirteen pairs. (3) The orang and the gibbons also agree with man in having five lumbar vertebrae, while in the gorilla and the chimpanzee there are but four, and sometimes only three. (4) The gorilla and chimpanzee agree with man in having eight small bones in the wrist, while the orang and the gibbons, as well as all other monkeys, have nine.[1]
The differences in the form, size, and attachments of the various bones, muscles, and other organs of these apes and
- ↑ Man and Apes. By St. George Mivart, F.R.S., 1873. It is an interesting fact (for which I am indebted to Mr. E. B. Poulton) that the human embryo possesses the extra rib and wrist-bone referred to above in (2) and (4) as occurring in some of the apes.
