MOKKEY ACTORS. 159 



the wheel comes off; this is their signal to stop. In teaching 

 the monkeys their parts a portion only of the scene is taught at 

 first; thus some days may be consumed in merely making the 

 actors occupy then- appointed positions properly — such slight 

 improprieties as the footman jumping down upon the heads of 

 the lady and gentleman, or the gentleman pulling the driver off 

 his seat by the tail, or the lady banging her cavalier over the 

 head with her parasol, and like exhibitions of playfulness, being 

 checked by applications of the whip. Gradually the '■^ btisiness " 

 of the scene is built up — each lesson including all performed up 

 to that time and a little in advance ; nuts, bread and an occasion- 

 al bit of candy, being the rewards for success, and whip for fail- 

 ure therein. Each monkey knowing his name, and being called 

 upon by name when his turn comes, he by-and-by learns the 

 proper time to perform his assigned work without any promptmg. 



The equestrian performances on pony or dog-back, styled 

 *'*' steeple chases,^' and like tricks usually exhibited, scarcely re- 

 quire notice here. However amusing they may be it can hardly 

 be said that the monkey's part of the exhibition requh-es much of 

 either intelligence or training^ as he is usually strapped upon his 

 steed and cannot very well help staying there. Sometimes, 

 however, instead of tyuig the monkey in the saddle, a perch is 

 erected on the fore part of the saddle, to which he clings fran- 

 tically as the dog or pony rushes around the ring. This is no 

 great improvement upon the strap, and the only training the 

 monkey gets is a cut from the whip whenever he permits him- 

 self to be dislodged. For a trainer to break a monkey so as to 

 ride a horse, carry a miniature flag, and hold on by the reins, is 

 commonly considered a remarkable achievement. Occasionally 

 though a monkey rider has been exhibited who has really per- 

 formed in a manner not merely absurd. The most notable 

 example of this kind was a huge ape of the cynocephalus or 

 dog face family, exhibited in the winter of 1867-8 at Lent's New 

 York Circus, under the title of the " Wonderful Cynocephalus.'^ 



Monsieur Olivier, a French circus manager, had taken a 

 troupe to India on speculation a short time previous to the 

 Sepoy mntiny, on the breaking out of which his company 

 disbanded, many joining the English troops. The manager 

 then wandered in search of an opening for professional specula- 

 tion, and while so doing attempted the training of several 

 varieties of the monkey tribe. His success was by no means 

 encouraging until, after years of failure, he came across the indi- 

 vidual who is the subject of this sketch. The Cynocephalus 

 was captured in Zanzibar, on the east cost of Africa, and from 

 the first exhibited unusual intelligence, and after many months 



