Chap. I.] MONKEYS. 131 



Although common m tlie southern and western provinces, 

 it is never found at a liigher elevation than 1300 

 feet. 



Wlien observed in their native wilds, a party of 

 twenty or thirty of these creatures is generally busily 

 engaged in the search for berries and buds. They 

 are seldom to be seen on the ground, and then only 

 when they have descended to recover seeds or fruit 

 that have fallen at the foot of their favourite trees. In 

 their alarm, when disturbed, their leaps are prodigious ; 

 but generally speaking, their ]3rogress is made not so 

 much by leapi7ig as by swinging from branch to branch, 

 using their powerful arms alternately ; and when 

 baffled by distance, flinging themselves obhquely so as 

 to catch the lower boughs of an opposite tree, the mo- 

 mentum acquired by their descent being sufficient to 

 cause a rebound, that carries them again upwards, till 

 they can grasp a higher branch ; and thus continue 

 their headlong flight. In these perilous achievements, 

 wonder is excited less by the surpassing agihty of these 

 httle creatures, frequently encumbered as they are by 

 their young, which chng to them in their career, than 

 by the quickness of their eye and the unerring accuracy 

 with which they seem almost to calculate the angle at 

 which a descent would enable them to cover a eriven 

 distance, and the recoil to elevate themselves again to a 

 higher altitude. 



2. The low country Wanderoo is replaced in the hills 

 by the larger species, P. ursinus, which inhabits the 

 mountain zone. The natives, Avho designate the latter 

 the Maha or Great Wanderoo, to distinguish it from 

 the Kaloo, or black one, with which they are famihar, 

 describe it as much wilder and more powerful than its 

 congener of the lowland forests. It is rarely seen by 

 Europeans, this portion of the country having till very 

 recently been but partially opened ; and even now it is 

 difficult to observe its habits, as it seldom approaches the 

 few roads which wind through these deep sohtudes. It 



K 2 



