Though each of these tailless apes has its own advantages, yet the gorilla is, on the whole, most advanced and nearest to man in structure. But his legs are still too short and thick, and his arms long, reaching to his knee; and the large projections on the back of his neck bones prevent him throwing his head well back, so that he stoops like a hunchback, while his feet are twisted so that he treads on the outside and not on the sole. His eye-teeth are huge, his eyes deeply sunken, his jaws heavy and strong, but his brain is not one-half the size of that of the lowest races of men, and though it has foldings very like those of the human brain, these are larger and less complex. When he walks it is not upright but on all fours, resting the knuckles of his hand on the ground; but when he is in his natural home--the trees--then his long strong arms and broad naked palmed hands grasp the boughs with immense power, and pull his heavy body upwards as he climbs hand over hand, his twisted toe-thumbed feet clutching the branches below far better than a straight foot could do. [Illustration: Fig. 66. The Gorilla at home.] And so he lives with his wife and family in the thick solitary parts of the West African forests, feeding only on fruits and leaves, so that his stomach becomes large and heavy with the amount of food necessary to nourish him. He is more sociable than the orangutan, for several will travel together, but he asks for no shelter beyond the trees and the nest of leaves, which is his home and the cradle of his young ones, nor does he seem to attack other animals except in self-defence, and then his gigantic strength and his formidable teeth are his chief weapons, and woe betide the creature that comes within his grasp. It is strange to picture to ourselves these huge apes, living in the depths of lonely forests and looking like human savages to those who can catch a glimpse of them, so that the ancient Carthaginians landing on the shores took them for “wild men” and “hairy women.” We know very little of their daily life, for they are seldom seen except by those who hunt them, and who have but little chance of watching their habits. But all that we do know teaches us that in their rough way they have developed into strangely man-like though savage creatures, while at the same time they are so brutal and so limited in their intelligence that we cannot but look upon them as degenerate animals, equal neither in beauty, strength, discernment, nor in any of the nobler qualities, to the faithful dog, the courageous lion, or the half-reasoning elephant. [Illustration: TROPICAL EUROPE OF LONG AGO] CHAPTER X. THE LARGE MILK-GIVERS WHICH HAVE CONQUERED THE WORLD BY STRENGTH AND INTELLIGENCE.