SACRED BABOONS. 



149 



keep a beggar-boy ad captandum, old baboons sometimes 

 kidnap a baby of another tribe, keep a strict watch on 

 its movements, but urge it with slaps and grunts to 

 work the passers-by. Crippled baboons, too, are a most 

 welcome acquisition to any clique. These twice-worthy 

 objects of charity have their regular headquarters, where 

 they can be found at any time of the day surrounded by 

 eupeptic relatives who hope to participate in the largess 

 of the pious. The poorest huckster will stop his cart 

 in a gate-way to hand his tribute to a decrepit bhunder- 

 monkey who supplicates him with outstretched hands. 

 No true believer must stint his gifts upon such occa- 

 sions ; and so well does the hairy mendicant know the 

 stringency of that duty that he flies out into a paroxysm 

 of virtuous wrath if any passer-by should dare to dis- 

 regard his appeal. The relatives promptly yield their 

 aid, and fruit-carts are in danger of being monkey- 

 mobbed if the driver hesitates to propitiate their resent- 

 ment by a liberal contribution. 



But the new-fangled conveyances of the foreign resi- 

 dents are thus often surrounded and stopped from sheer 

 inquisitiveness. The Indian city-baboons have begun 

 to take an abstract interest in human affairs. They will 

 gather around a ranting quack, a revivalist, or a broken- 

 down buggy, without any direct view to backshish. If 

 a number of people run toward the scene of an accident, 

 the monkeys race after them like dogs ; if the Brahmins 

 get up a pageant, the baboons join in the procession. 



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