MONKEYS. 



255 



about its waddling movements that speaks as plainly 

 as words can say, " Any undue hurrying of my 

 locomotion, any forced precipitancy in my movements 

 will be rewarded with my severest displeasure." 



While making these comments on the characters 

 of both the animals under observation, the violence 

 of the exercise which my follower was undergoing 

 commenced to tell upon his powers of endurance, 

 or the delay he was submitted to lessened his zeal, 

 so I deemed it better to select my victims and fire. 

 The right barrel did its work clean, the left was 

 not so effective, yet it tumbled the object aimed at 

 into a crevice beneath, where it fell upon its back, 

 and from which position it was unable to extricate 

 itself, either from its rotundity of person or the 

 severity of its wound. But pause, reader, before I 

 pick the game up, and observe the effects of the 

 sound of my rifle's reports upon the animal life 

 that was so lately in view. To the left the monkeys 

 will be perceived going as if ''the old scratch'* 

 himself was after them, hopping and bounding with 

 tails in the air, and evidently only intent on their 

 individual safety ; selfish the quintessence of selfish- 

 ness they undoubtedly are, giving them an additional 



