Will Cuppy Tonight: "The Gibbon" from "How to Tell Your Friends from the Apes"

Index note: The "Thurber (et al.) Tonight" index has (finally) been updated, and should now be current!

"Gibbon authorities do not know whether the Gibbon is interested in sex. But you know and I know."


Tonight Will Cuppy continues his survey of ape relations, begun with "The Chimpanzee," "The Gorilla," and "The Orang-utan." -- Ken

The Gibbon

THOSE THIN LONG-WAISTED TYPES with no head to speak of are generally Gibbons. Gibbons are our loudest Apes. Their peculiar cry is often described as hoo hoo hoo hoo and just as often as whopp whopp whopp whopp. Gibbons assemble in crowds and hoo or whopp until exhausted or shot. The natives of Cochin China, the Malay Archipelago and the Island of Hainan often have hoo or whopp madness. A noiseless Gibbon would be a godsend. There is an old saying that the Gibbon is at his best in the American Museum of Natural History.¹ The female Wau-wau or Silvery Gibbon of Java is rather pretty for a Wau-wau. The Hoolock of Upper Assam cannot swim. Gibbons are noted for the number and variety of things they cannot do. It is believed that the Gibbon could be taught to swat flies. Gibbons live in the treetops. They swing from branch to branch by their arms with amazing speed. They are not going to fires. They are going nowhere in particular. Experiments with the Gibbon prove many interesting things about the Long-nosed Bandicoot. Gibbon authorities do not know whether the Gibbon is interested in sex. But you know and I know. There are no Apes in this country, thank goodness.²

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
¹Cf. "Decline and Fall of the Gibbon."
²Embalmed Gibbons are sometimes sold to country bump kins as embalmed Pigmies. Why our rural population should prefer embalmed Pigmies to embalmed Gibbons offers an in teresting problem in psychology.


TOMORROW IN WILL CUPPY TONIGHT: The Baboon


THURBER TONIGHT (including BENCHLEY, WILL CUPPY, WOLCOTT GIBBS, RING LARDNER, BOB AND RAY, E. B. WHITE, JEAN SHEPHERD, and PERELMAN TONIGHT): Check out the series to date

As noted above, after an unfortunate period of sloughing off, I've finally updated the "Thurber (et al.) Tonight" index, and will try to get back to keeping it current. I've even put the "et al." authors in alphabetical order! Is this an elite reference tool or what?

#