Orang

Orang, Oeang-utan, the name by which the great nnthropoid ape (Simia satyrus) of Borneo and Sumatra is known to western nations. The first name, a shortened form of the second ("man of the woods"), is applied by the Malays to a forest tribe of low culture. The anthropoid they call mias, mias pappan and mias rambi denoting the dark and the pale race respectively - the former with, and the latter without, fleshy excrescences on the face, and mias kassir, the smaller variety, described by the late Sir Richard Owen as S.morio. The larger form when adult is a little over four feet in height, and is clothed with long, coarse, reddish-brown hair. It is arboreal in habit, living among the topmost branches of trees, and feeding on fruit, leaves, and tender shoots, destroying much more than it eats. In confinement orangs will eat eggs and meat, and it is probable that in the wild state they catch and eat birds as do the gorilla and chimpanzee. The stories told of the ferocity of the orang are probably, no doubt unconsciously, exaggerated. Its strength makes it, when enraged, a formidable opponent, but unless attacked k seems not to molest man, and many of the specimens kept in confinement have been very good-tempered.