| OCR Text |
Show 1870.] MR. R. SWINHOE ON THE MAMMALS OF HAINAN. 225 Du Halde (Description de la Chine, A.D. 1735, tome i. p. 230), in au account of the natural productions of Hainan, writes :-"Among the animals that the island produces is seen a curious species of Great Black Ape, whose physiognomy somewhat approaches the human face ; so well are the features marked ; but this species is rare." Having learnt of the existence of this Black Ape in Hainan, I naturally never ceased to inquire after it. Every one knew that such an animal did exist, and many had seen it; but they all spoke of the great difficulty of keeping it alive. At Taipingsze (Central Hainan) the wonderful stories that were told about it showed that the Yuen was not often seen there. The magistrate of that district assured me, with a serious face, that it had the power of drawing into its body its long arm-bones, and that when it drew in one arm it pushed out the other to such an extraordinary length that he believed the two bones united in the body ; and he said that the bones of the arm were used for chopsticks. At Lingshuy (S.E. Hainan) the magistrate knew the animal and had kept it alive. His military colleague was in the hill-districts, but he would be back in a few days; and if we could wait, the magistrate thought he could get us a live specimen of the Ape. At all events, he would procure the animal and take it with him for us to Canton, whither he hoped to go before long. W e could not, of course, wait, and we never heard of the mandarin or his good intentions again. At Nychow (S. Hainan) the commodore's secretary told me that only a few days previous to our visit he had had one alive, but that it had died, and he had had it buried. At m y request he had the remains looked for. The top of the skull was all that was found ; the dogs had destroyed the rest. He gave me this fragment, as also a pair of ulnee of an older animal, which he was going to turn into chopsticks (the Chinese " knife and fork," so to speak). On our return to the capital of Hainan a rumour reached us that one existed in confinement in the city. The admiral there took the matter in hand and did his best to secure it for us. But the rumour was false; no such animal could be found; so we had to leave Hainan with only the fragments above mentioned of this much desired Wooyuen. The portion of the skull obtained is that of a very young animal, and is therefore of not much value for determining the species. But the ulnee are apparently adult, and are certainly those of a species of Hylobates. Length of ulna of adult 11*4 inches. On the 9th of April, 1861, a paper was read by Dr. J. E. Gray before this Society on a collection of Mammals & e made by M. Mouhot in Cambodia (P. Z. S. I. ci), in which a species oi Hylobates (II. pileatus) was described from an island off Cambodia. There is a fine stuffed group of this in the Mammal Gallery of the British Museum, showing the varieties of colour spoken of by the Chinese author, which, as Dr. Gray points out, are due to age and sex. This species from Cambodia must be closely related to, if not identical with, the Wooyuen of Hainan. The jet-black Rock-Yuen referred to in the Gazetteer may possibly |
