ATE LRUS 21 



Subfamily 4. Cebinae. 

 GENUS *ATELEUS. SPIDER MONKEYS. 



T 2—2 „ 1—1 „ 3—3 ., 3—3 , 



1.2-2; C. illi; P. 3"_3; M. 3113 = 36. 



ATELES ( !) E. Geoff., Ann. Mus. Hist. Nat. Paris, VII, 1806, p. 



262. Type Simia paniscus Linnaeus. 

 Cercopithecus Blumenb., Handb. Naturg., I, 1779, p. 68. (nee 



Gronow, 1763, nee Brunnich, 1772, nee Erxleben, 1777). 

 Sapajus Kerr, Anim. Kingd., Mamm., I, 1792, p. 74, (Part). 

 Sapajou Laceped., Tabl. Mamm., 1799, p. 4. 

 Atelocheirus E. Geoff., Ann. Mus. Hist. Nat. Paris, VII, 1806, p. 



272. 

 Paniscus Rafin., Analyse de la Nature, 1815, p. 53, (nee Schrank. 



1802 Hymenopt.). 

 Sapaju Ritgen, Naturl. Einth. Saugth. Giess., 1824, p. 33. 



Body light, slender ; limbs long, slender ; arms longer than legs ; 

 head rounded, muzzle projecting; thumb rudimentary, or absent; tail 

 very long, naked beneath, tip prehensible ; fur coarse, not woolly ; 

 canines large with a diastema between them and the incisors ; middle 

 upper incisors long, broad, larger than outer ; molars four cusped with 

 transverse ridges between. 



The Spider Monkeys constitute one of the most remarkable groups 

 of the Primates, and the tail as a prehensile organ has attained what 

 may be considered the greatest degree of perfection of which it is 

 capable. As an arboreal animal this Monkey represents the highest 

 development of the Quadrumana of the New World as far as known, 

 no other member of the Order in past or present time, in the Western 

 Hemisphere, has approached nearer the higher forms of the Old 

 World. 



The tail is unsurpassed, if not unequalled, in its flexibility, always 

 in motion, the tip as sensitive as that of the elephant's trunk, grasping 



♦AreXjjtr a priv. and reXoo-.foo- a neuter noun, which with the a priv. 

 would be, when Latinized, Ateleus, which should be the generic name for the 

 Spider Monkeys. 



