seems to affect him far more than it does other apes.
Unlike the Gibbons, whose forearms do the greater part of the work,
as they swing from branch to branch, the Orang never makes even the
smallest jump. In climbing, he moves alternately one hand and one foot,
or, after having laid fast hold with the hands, he draws up both feet
together. In passing from one tree to another, he always seeks out a
place where the twigs of both come close together, or interlace. Even
when closely pursued, his circumspection is amazing: he shakes the
branches to see if they will bear him, and then bending an overhanging
bough down by throwing his weight gradually along it, he makes a bridge
from the tree he wishes to quit to the next. [21]

On the ground the Orang always goes laboriously and shakily, on all
fours. At starting he will run faster than a man, though he may soon be
overtaken. The very long arms which, when he runs, are but little bent,
raise the body of the Orang remarkably, so that he assumes much the
posture of a very old man bent down by age, and making his way along by
the help of a stick. In walking, the body is usually directed straight
forward, unlike the other apes, which run more or less obliquely;
except the Gibbons, who in these, as in so many other respects, depart
remarkably from their fellows.

The Orang cannot put its feet flat on the ground, but is supported upon
their outer edges, the heel resting more on the ground, while the curved
toes partly rest upon the ground by the upper side of their first joint,
the two outermost toes of each foot completely resting on this surface.
The hands are held in the opposite manner, their inner edges serving as
the chief support. The fingers are then bent out in such a manner that
their foremost joints, especially those of the two innermost fingers,
rest upon the ground by their upper sides, while the point of the free
and straight thumb serves as an additional fulcrum.

The Orang never stands on its hind legs, and all the pictures,
representing it as so doing, are as false as the assertion that it
defends itself with sticks, and the like.

The long arms are of especial use, not only in climbing, but in the
gathering of food from boughs to which the animal could not trust his
weight. Figs, blossoms, and young leaves of various kinds, constitute
the chief nutriment of the Orang; but strips of bamboo two or three
feet long were found in the stomach of a male. They are not