The great distinction between the two animals is that the Nschiego’s
forehead, formed by the frontal bone, rises up from the great brow
ridge, and is visible from the front. This is not the case with
the Gorilla, whose forehead recedes greatly. Both animals have the
same number of ribs (thirteen), but those of the Nschiego are more
man-shaped and are not so broad and close together; and their chests
differ in breadth, for the breast-bone of the new Ape is narrower, but
it is long and thick. The blade-bone, so important to the Gorilla, is
equally so to the Nschiego, but it is longer and narrower on the back,
and its spine is very oblique. Possibly this conformation of the bone
may have to do with the constant climbing of the Bald-headed Ape, but
nevertheless the spines on the neck-bones, which give origin to such
exceedingly strong muscles in the Gorilla, are much smaller in the
Nschiego. The first neck-bone, or atlas, has no spine in this Ape, in
which it is like man, and the axis, or second, has a forked spine, and
is crested at the end, but otherwise is like that in man.
Finally, the rudiment of a tail is like that end of the back-bone found
in the Gorilla and in man.
These are the principal points and the most important distinctions;
they show that the Nschiego cannot be of the same kind or species as
the Gorilla, but is a Troglodyte, resembling the Gorilla somewhat in
its skeleton, and although smaller than the male, still quite, if not
more, man-shaped.
The London Zoological Society own a fine example of the Bald-headed
Chimpanzee (_Anthropopithecus calvus_), which, under the name of
“Sally,” is known to every frequenter of their famous Gardens, where it
has resided since October, 1883.
THE KOOLO-KAMBA.[9]
This kind of Troglodyte is celebrated for saying koola-koolo over
and over again as its favourite cry, for having a very extraordinary
frog-like figure, and for being one of those creatures which are
exceedingly interesting to zoologists, because they are, as it were,
half one thing and half another.
A neighbour of the great Apes already noticed, it associates also with
the common Chimpanzee, in the quiet forests of Western Equatorial
Africa. In one of these Du Chaillu first saw it, and he describes his
discovery as follows:--
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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