human
Peterkin, said I anxiously,
gpt
I mean, replied he slowly,
human
Come, now, I see you are jesting.
gpt
Am I? cried Peterkin savagely--
human
But I saw the skeleton of one in London.
gpt
I don't care for that. You may have been deceived, humbugged. Perhaps it was a compound of the bones of a buffalo and a chimpanzee.
human
Nay, that were impossible, said I quickly;
gpt
What like was the skeleton, Ralph?
human
It was nearly as tall as that of a medium-sized man--I should think about five feet seven or eight inches; but the amazing part about it was the immense size and thickness of its bones. Its shoulders were much broader than yours, Jack, and your chest is a mere child's compared with that of the specimen of the gorilla that I saw. Its legs were very short--much shorter than those of a man; but its arms were tremendous-- they were more than a foot longer than yours. In fact, if the brute's legs were in the same proportion to its body as are those of a man, it would be a giant of ten or eleven feet high. Or, to take another view of it, if you were to take a robust and properly proportioned giant of that height, and cut down his legs until he stood about the height of an ordinary man, _that_ would be a gorilla.
gpt
I don't believe it,
human
Well, perhaps my simile is not quite so felicitous as--
gpt
I don't mean that, interrupted Peterkin;
human
I mean that I don't believe there's such a brute as a gorilla at all.
gpt
Why, what has made you so sceptical?
human
The nonsense that these niggers have been telling me, through the medium of Mak as an interpreter; that is what has made me sceptical. Only think, they say that a gorilla is so strong that he can lift a man by the nape of the neck clean off the ground with one of his hind feet! Yes, they say he is in the habit of sitting on the lower branches of trees in lonely dark parts of the wood watching for prey, and when a native chances to pass by close enough he puts down his hind foot, seizes the wretched man therewith, lifts him up into the tree, and quietly throttles him. They don't add whether or not he eats him afterwards, or whether he prefers him boiled or roasted. Now, I don't believe that.
gpt
Neither do I, returned Jack;
human
Go to, you sophist! if what you say be true, and the gorilla turns out to be only an exaggerated chimpanzee or ring-tailed roarer, does not that come to the same thing as saying that there is no gorilla at all-- always, of course, excepting yourself?
gpt
Credit yourself with a punched head, said Jack,
human
Without deigning any rejoinder to the utterly absurd and totally irrelevant matter contained in the preliminary sentences of your last remark, I pass on to observe that the natives of these wilds hold the opinion that there is one species of the gorilla which is the residence of the spirits of defunct niggers, and that these fellows are known by their unusual size and ferocity.
gpt
Hold, cried I,
human
Honour bright, said he,
gpt
I'll give it you just as I got it. These _possessed_ brutes are never caught, and can't be killed. (I only hope I may get the chance to try whether that be true or not.) They often carry off natives into the woods, where they pull out their toe and finger nails by the roots and then let them go; and they are said to be uncommonly fond of sugar-cane, which they steal from the fields of the natives sometimes in a very daring manner.
human
Is that all?
gpt
All! exclaimed my comrade.
human
How much more would you have? Do you suppose that the gorilla can do anything it likes--hang by its tail from the moon, or sit down on its nose and run round on its chin?
gpt
Massa Jack, said Makarooroo, entering the hut and interrupting our conversation at this point,
human
Cottle, Mak! what's _cottle_?
gpt
Ho, massa, you know bery well; jist cottle--hoxes, you know.
human
Indeed, I don't know,
gpt
I've no doubt, interposed Peterkin,
human
O massas, you be most stoopid dis yer day. Cottle not a ting; hims am a beast, wid two horn an' one tail. Dere, said he, pointing with animation to a herd of cattle that grazed near our hut,
gpt
What! cried Jack,
human
Yis, massa, hims say dat. Hims hear long ago ob one missionary as hab do dat; so de chief he tink it bery good idea, an' hims try too, an' like it bery much; only hims fell off ebery tree steps an' a'most broke all de bones in him's body down to powder. But hims git up agin and fell hoff agin. Oh, hims like it bery much!
gpt
If we follow the chief's example, said I, laughing,
human
Right, Ralph, said Jack.--
gpt
Go, Mak, and tell his majesty, or chieftainship, or his royal highness, with my compliments, that I am much obliged by the offer, and will consider it. Also give him this plug of tobacco; and see you don't curtail its dimensions before it leaves your hand, you rascal.