Chap. II.] MENTAL POWERS. 41 



may be called magnanimity. Several observers have 

 stated that monkeys certainly dislike being laughed at ; 

 and they sometimes invent imaginary offences. In the 

 Zoological Gardens I saw a baboon who always got into 

 a furious rage when his keeper took out a letter or book 

 and read it aloud to him; and his rage was so violent that, 

 as I witnessed on one occasion, he bit his own leg till the 

 blood flowed. 



We will now turn to the more intellectual emotions 

 and faculties, which are very important, as forming the 

 basis for the development of the higher mental powers. 

 Animals manifestly enjoy excitement and suffer from 

 ennui, as may be seen with dogs, and, according to Reng- 

 ger, with monkeys. All animals feel wonder, and many 

 exhibit curiosity. They sometimes suffer from this latter 

 quality, as when the hunter plays antics and thus attracts 

 them ; I have witnessed this with deer, and so it is with 

 the wary chamois, and with some kinds of wild-ducks. 

 Brehm gives a curious account of the instinctive dread 

 which his monkeys exhibited toward snakes ; but their 

 curiosity was so great that they could not desist from oc- 

 casionallv satiatino; their horror in a most human fashion, 

 by lifting up the lid of the box in which the snakes were 

 kept. I was so much surprised at his account, that I took 

 a stuffed and coiled-up snake into the monkey-house at the 

 Zoological Gardens, and the excitement thus caused was 

 one of the most curious spectacles which I ever beheld. 

 Three species of Cercopithecus were the most alarmed ; 

 they dashed about their cages and uttered sharp signal- 

 cries of danger, which were understood by the other 

 monkeys. A few young monkeys and one old Anubis 

 baboon alone took no notice of the snake. I then placed 

 the stuffed specimen on the ground in one of the larger 

 compartments. After a time all the monkeys collected 

 round it in a large circle, and, staring intently, presented 

 3 



