ed, and to create between it and these last very
remarkable distinctions.

"The Angola orang (_Simia troglodytes_ Lin.) is the highest animal;
it is much more perfect than the orang of the Indies (_Simia
satyrus_ Lin.), which is called the orang-outang, and, nevertheless,
as regards their structure they are both very inferior to man in
bodily faculties and intelligence. These animals often stand erect;
but this attitude is not habitual, their organization not having
been sufficiently modified, so that standing still (_station_) is
painful for them.

"It is known, from the accounts of travellers, especially in regard
to the orang of the Indies, that when immediate danger obliges it to
fly, it immediately falls on all fours. This betrays, they tell us,
the true origin of this animal, since it is obliged to abandon the
alien unaccustomed partially erect attitude which is thrust upon it.

"Without doubt this attitude is foreign to it, since in its change
of locality it makes less use of it, which shows that its
organization is less adapted to it; but though it has become easier
for man to stand up straight, is the erect posture wholly natural to
him?

"Although man, who, by his habits, maintained in the individuals of
his species during a great series of generations, can stand erect
only while changing from one place to another, this attitude is not
less in his case a condition of fatigue, during which he is able to
maintain himself in an upright position only during a limited time
and with the aid of the contraction of several of his muscles.

"If the vertebral column of the human body should form the axis of
this body, and sustain the head in equilibrium, as also the other
parts, the man standing would be in a state of rest. But who does
not know that this is not so; that the head is not articulated at
its centre of gravity; that the chest and stomach, as also the
viscera which these cavities contain, weigh heavily almost entirely
on the anterior part of the vertebral column; that the latter rests
on an oblique base, etc.? Also, as M. Richerand observes, there is
needed in standing a force active and watching without ceasing to
prevent the body from falling over, the weight and disposition of
parts tending to make the body fall forward.

"After having developed the considerations regarding the standing
posture of man, the same savant then e