The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1883-03-02
Krao, the ssHuman Monkey.n


Through the courtesy of Mr.. Farini.
have had private interview with this
curious little waif. which he is now ex-
hibiting at the Royal Aquarium, West
minister. and for which he claims the
distinction of being the long-sought-for
missing link" between man and the
anthropoid apes. KraO certainly pre-
sents some abnormal peculiarities, but
they are scarcely of a sufficiently pro-
nounced type to justify the claim. She
is, in fact, a, distinctly human child, ap-
parently about seven years old, endowed
with an average share of intelligence,
and possessing the faculty OF articulate
speech. Since her arrival about ten weeks
ago in London, she has acquired several
English words. which she uses intelli-
gently, and not merely parrot-fashion,
as has been stated. Thus, on my sud-
denly producing my watch at the inter-
view, she was attracted by. the glitter,
and cried out cock. cock, that is, clock.
clock! This showed considerable pow
ers of generalization, accompanied by q
somewhat defective articulation, and it
appears that her phonetic system does
not yet embrace the liquids and r. But
in this and other respects her education
is progressing favorably, and she has
already so far adapted herself to civil
lied ways, that the mere threat to be sent
back to her own people is always suffi-
cient to suppress any symptoms OF I'M
ruly conduct. ,., -. .I..,
Physically, Krao presents several Pc
culiar features. The head and low fore
head are covered down to the busy eye
brows with the deep black, lank and
lustreless hair characteristic of the Mon.
goloid races. The whole body is also
Overgrown with far less dense coating
of soft. black hair about quarter of an
inch long, but nowhere close enough to
conceal the color of the skin, which may
be described as of dark olive-brown
shade. The nose is extremely short and
low, with excessively broad nostrils.
merging in the full, pouched cheeks. into
which she appears to have the habit OF
stuffing her food, monkey-fashion. Like
those of the anthropoids, her feet are also
prehensile, and the hands so flexible that
they bend quite back over the wrists.
The thumb also doubles completely
back. and of the four fingers, all the top
joints bend at pleasure independently
inward. Prognathism seems to be very
slightly developed and the beautiful
round black eyes are very large and per-
fectly horizontal. Hence the expression
is on the whole far from unpleasing, and
not nearly so ape-like as that of many
Negritos. But it should be mentioned
that when in a pet, Krao's lips are said
to protrude so far as to give her "quite a
chimpanzee look"
Apart from her history one might feel
disposed to regard this specimen merely
as a ''sport" or lusus nature, possessed
rather Of a pathological than of strictly
anthropological interest. Certainly iso-
lated cases of hairy persons. and even
of hairy families, are not unknown to
science. Several were figured in recent
number of the Berlin Zeitschrift far Eth
nologie, and, if remember, both Craw-
furd ('Journal of an Embassy to Ava')
and Colonel Yule Omission to the Coast
of Ava) speak of a hairy family resident
for two or three generations at the Bur-
mese capital. This family is reported to
have come originally from the interior
of the Lao country, and in the same
region we are now told that little'krao
and herparents, also hairy people, were
found last year by the well-known East
ern explorer, MIR. Carl Book. Soon after
their capture the father died of cholera,
while the mother was detained at Bang
kok by the Siamese Government, so that
Krao alone could be brought to England.
But before his death a photograph of the
father was taken by Mr.. Book, who de-
scribes him as completely covered with
thick hairy coat, exactly like that of
the anthropoid apes."-A. II. Keane, in
Nature. .-.... ... .'