2O 



The Living Animals of the World 



victory, they were at a loss 

 to guess who these new foes 

 might be. The alarm was 

 given, and the Macedonian 

 troops set out in battle-array. 

 Ihen through the morning 

 mists they saw that the 

 enemy was an immense troop 

 of monkeys. Their prisoners, 

 who knew what the alarm 

 was caused by, made no small 

 sport of the Macedonians. 



THE SPEECH OF MONKEYS. 



Something should be said 

 of the alleged " speech of 

 monkeys " which Professor 

 Garner believed himself to 

 have discovered. He rightly 

 excluded mere sounds showing 

 joy, desire, or sorrow from the 

 faculty of speech, but claimed 

 to have detected special words, 

 one meaning "food," another 

 "drink," another "give me 

 that," .another meaning 

 " monkey," or an identification 

 of a second animal or monkey. 

 He used a phonograph to keep 

 permanent record of the 

 sounds, and made an expe- 

 dition to the West African 



forests in the hope that he might induce the large anthropoid apes to answer the sounds 

 which are so often uttered by their kind in our menageries. The enterprise ended, as might 

 have been expected, in failure. Nor was it in the least necessary to go and sit in a cage in 

 an African forest in the hope of striking up an acquaintance with the native chimpanzees. The 

 little Capuchin monkeys, whose voices and sounds he had ample opportunity of observing here, 

 give sufficient material for trying experiments in the meaning of monkey sounds. The writer 

 believes that it is highly probable that the cleverer monkeys have a great many notes or 

 sounds which the others do understand, if only because they make the same under similar 

 circumstances, otherwise they would not utter them. They are like the sounds which an 

 intelligent but nearly dumb person might make. Also they have very sharp ears, and some 

 of them can understand musical sounds, so far as to show a very marked attention to them. 

 The following account of an experiment of this kind, when a violin was being played, is related 

 in " Life at the Zoo " : " The Capuchin monkeys, the species selected by Professor Garner 

 for his experiments in monkey language, showed the strangest and most amusing excitement. 

 These pretty little creatures have very expressive and intelligent faces, and the play and 

 mobility of their faces and voices while listening to the music were extraordinarily rapid. 

 The three in the first cage at once rushed up into their box, and then all peeped out, chattering 

 and excited. One by one they came down, and listened to the music with intense curiosity, 

 shrieking and making faces at a crescendo, shaking the wires angrily at a discord, and 



Photo by Ottomar AnsckGiz] [JJerlin. 



CHACMA BABOON. 

 This photograph shows his attitude when about to make an attack. 



