32 THE MINDS AND MANNERS 



mouth widely with my fingers, and tried to surprise her into 

 saying "Ah," but with no result. It seems almost impossible 

 to stamp the vocal-sound idea upon the mind of an orang- 

 utan or chimpanzee. Polly uttered two distinct and clearly 

 cut syllables, and it really seemed as if her vocal organs could 

 have done more if called upon. 



The cries of the monkeys, baboons and lemurs are practi- 

 cally nothing more than squeals, shrieks or roars. The ba- 

 boons (several species, at least) bark or roar most explosively, 

 using the syllable "Wah!" It is only by the most liberal 

 interpretation of terms that such cries can be called language. 

 The majority express only two emotions — dissatisfaction and 

 expectation. Every primate calls for help in the same way 

 that human beings do, by shrill screaming; but none of them 

 ever cry "Oh" or "Ah." 



The only members of the monkey tribe who ever spoke to 

 me in their native forests were the big black langurs of the 

 Animallai Hills in Southern India. They used to glare down 

 at us, and curse us horribly whenever we met. Had we been 

 big pythons instead of men they could not have said "Con- 

 found you!" any more plainly or more vehemently than they 

 did. 



In those museum-making days our motto was "All's fish 

 that cometh to net"; and we killed monkeys for their skins 

 and skeletons the same as other animals. My brown-skinned 

 Mulcer hunters said that the bandarlog hated me because of 

 my white skin. At all events, as we stalked silently through 

 those forests, half a dozen times a day we would hear an awful 

 explosion overhead, startling to men who were still-hunting 

 big game, and from the middle zone of the tree-tops black and 

 angry faces would peer down at us. They said: "Wah! Wah! 

 Wah! Ali-hoo-oo-hoo-oo-hoo-oo\" and it was nothing else than 

 cursing and blackguarding. How those monkeys did hate us! 

 I never have encountered elsewhere anything like it in monkey- 

 land. 



