EXPLANATORY INDEX. 437 



that one would not look for in a monkey, and a knowledge 

 that it would eventually reap a reward for its hard labour. 



" Goodness knows how long it takes one of these monkeys 

 to break a nut-case \ but the time must be great, for on one 

 occasion, we got quietly amongst a lot of the nut breakers, 

 and secured a nut case which one in its hurry had left upon a 

 log, and which was worn smooth by the friction of the mon- 

 key's hands. This had evidently been pounded for a length o 

 time, but showed no signs of cracking. Its natural aperture 

 was large enough to allow the monkey's finger to touch the 

 nds of the nuts inside, which were picked and worn by its 

 nails. Near the same place we saw a nut-case split in two, 

 on the flat surface of a large granite rock, that had evidently 

 been broken by a monkey, for there were no Brazil-nut trees 

 from which it could have fallen, overhanging the spot." 



There are several species belonging to the genus Cebus, and 

 they are called by the general name of Capucins. 



MOXKEYS AND MISSILES. Waterton, as will here ba seen, 

 entirely denies that any monkey can use a missile, and recurs 

 to the subject in one of his essays. In this article ho offers to 

 accompany any one to any collection of monkeys, and to supply 

 the animals with stones, tile^, lead, pewter-pots and sawdust, 

 all of which articles he has been told had been used as missiles 

 against human beings by monkeys. He offers, in his own 

 amusingly trenchant style, to give the monkeys every oppor- 

 tunity of hurling these objects at him, and that if one of 

 them does so, he will admit that the knowledge which he had 

 acquired " during a long sojourn in the forests of Guiana (the 

 native haunts of monkeys) is rotten, and not worth one single 

 farthing." 



There can be no doubt that Waterton is perfectly right in 

 denying that any monkey which he had seen threw stones or 

 any missiles by way of defence. Most monkeys can catch a 

 missile, and many are adroit enough to catch flies on the wing. 

 But, although they can catch, they seldom throw. Still, they 

 are able to drop branches, &c., from the tops of trees, not 



