SOME NATIVE LEGENDS 



clans, and do fierce battle ; in these combats discipline and 

 co-operation are apparent, an interesting foreshadowing 

 of human ways. The Hanuman is exceedingly agile, 

 and will bound from branch to branch, sometimes 

 attaining to a leap of 20 to 30 feet measured horizontally, 

 but rendered easier by a corresponding drop of 40 to 50 

 feet. In spite of this astounding activity, F. Cuvier 

 stigmatized the groups as " slow monkeys " ! The 

 Hanuman shares with man a detestation and fear of the 

 tiger ; a group or troupe of these monkeys will follow 

 a tiger, making Simian remarks, and plainly indicating 

 its position to the following hunters. In Siam it is held 

 among various native traditions that the Semnopitheci 

 are dangerous apes to the human kind ; that they play 

 the part of vampires, and suck the blood of sleeping men 

 in the forests. But there is no truth in this belief, the 

 Semnopitheci being, as a matter of fact, vegetarian 

 in the extreme even for a monkey. No insects and 

 grubs of various kinds, no eggs and young birds enter 

 their purely leafy, fruit, and grain diet. In captivity 

 these animals are described as sedate and indolent till 

 old age supervenes, which induces a more truculent 

 demeanour. The nosed ape, Rhinopithecus, with a 

 little upturned and pointed nose, not snout, has been 

 referred to. There is another form known as Nasalis 

 larvatus, which has also a longish nose quite human in 

 sharpness and length . These forms are the only monkeys 

 with anything comparable to the human nose. 



THE GUEREZA 



It is interesting to note that while the macaques of 

 the East are represented in Africa by the closely allied 

 Guenons and Mangabeys, the Semnopitheci of the East 

 are also represented in Africa by a type of monkey 

 closely allied to themselves but forming a distinct 



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