512 THE TROPICAL WOULD. 



this admirable organ rolls round the boughs as though it were 

 a supple finger, and is at the same time so muscular that the 

 monkey frequently swings with it from a branch like the pen- 

 dulum of a clock. Scarce has he grasped a bough with his long 

 arms, when immediately coiling his fifth hand round the branch, 

 he springs on to the next, and secure from a fall, hurries so 

 rapidly through the crowns of the highest trees that the 

 sportsman's ball has scarce time to reach him in his flight. 



AVhen the Miriki {Ateles hypoxanthus), the largest of the 

 Brazilian monkeys, sitting or stretched out at full length, suns 

 himself on a high branch, his tail suffices to support him in his 

 aerial resting-place, and even when mortally wounded, he re- 

 mains a long time suspended by it, until life being quite ex- 

 tinct, his heavy body, whizzing through the air, and breaking 

 many a bough as it descends, falls with a loud crash to the 

 ground. 



In general the American monkeys are distinguished by a 

 much milder disposition than those of the eastern hemisphere, 

 and retain at an advanced age the playful manners of their 

 youth. They are commonly more easy to tame, and learn many 

 little tricks which are taught with much greater difficulty 

 to their restless Asiatic or African cousins. Their weakness, 

 their short canine teeth, their good temper, render them 

 harmless play-fellows, and thus they are generally preferred in 

 Europe to the Old World monkeys, though they are not so 

 lively, and constantly have a more or less dejected mien, as if 

 they still regretted the primitive freedom of the forest. 



The American monkeys may be conveniently divided into 

 two large groups ; with or without a prehensile tail. To the 

 first great subdivision belong the Howling Monkeys or Aluates 

 {Mycetes), the Spider Monkeys (Ateles), the Sajous, and 

 several other intermediate genera. 



The Aluates are chiefly remarkable for their stentorian 

 powers, which no other animal can equal or approach. When 

 the nocturnal howl of the Large Eed Howling Monkey [Mycetes 

 ursinus) bursts forth from the woods, you would suppose that 

 all the beasts of the forest were collecting for the work of 

 carnage. Now it is the tremendous roar of the jaguar as 

 he springs on his prey; now it changes to his terrible and 

 deep-toned growlings as he is pressed on all sides by superior 



