again to the cage she had left—a feat requiring not only great strength, but the nicest precision."
The Gibbons appear to be naturally very gentle, but there is very good evidence that they will bite severely when irritated—a female Hylobates agilis having so severely lacerated one man with her long canines, that he died; while she had injured others so much that, by way of precaution, these formidable teeth had been filed down; but, if threatened, she would still turn on her keeper. The Gibbons eat insects, but appear generally to avoid animal food. A Siamang, however, was seen by Mr. Bennett to seize and devour greedily a live lizard. They commonly drink by dipping their fingers in the liquid and then licking them. It is asserted that they sleep in a sitting posture.
Duvaucel affirms that he has seen the females carry their young to the waterside and there wash their faces, in spite of resistance and cries. They are gentle and afiectionate in captivity—full of tricks and pettishness, like spoiled children, and yet not devoid of a certain conscience, as an anecdote, told by Mr. Bennett (l. c. p. 156), will show. It would appear that his Gibbon had a peculiar inclination for disarranging things in the cabin. Among these articles, a piece of soap would especially attract his notice, and for the removal of this he had been once or twice scolded. "One morning," says Mr. Bennett, "I was writing, the ape being present in the cabin, when casting my eyes towards him, I saw the little fellow taking the soap. I watched him without his perceiving that I did so: and he occasionally would cast a furtive glance towards the place where I sat. I pretended to write; he, seeing me busily occupied, took the soap, and moved away with it in his paw. When he had walked
