i8o APES AND MONKEYS. 



contrast between these colours and the vivid scarlet of the naked part of the face 

 must be very striking when the animal is alive ; but, owing to the fugitive nature 

 of the face-pigment, all this is lost in museum specimens. 



This monkey has an extremely limited distribution, being found only on the 

 left bank of the Amazon, in the neighbourhood of Ega; its small area being 

 limited to the east by the River Japura, and to the west by the Putumayo, or lea, 

 as it is often called. Mr. Bates states that in this area the uakari " lives in small 

 troops amongst the crowns of the lofty trees, subsisting on fruits of various kinds. 

 Hunters say it is pretty nimble in its motions, but is not much given to leaping, 

 preferring to run up and down the larger boughs in travelling from tree to tree. 

 The mother, as in the other species of the monkey order, carries her young on her 

 back. Individuals are obtained alive by shooting them with the blow-pipe and 

 arrows tipped with diluted urari poison. They run a considerable distance after 

 being pierced, and it requires an experienced hunter to track them. He is 

 considered the most expert who can keep pace with a wounded one, and catch it 

 in his arms when it falls exhausted. A pinch of salt, the antidote to the poison, 

 is then put into its mouth, and the creature revives. The species is rare, even in the 

 limited district which it inhabits. 



" Adult uakaris, caught in the way described, very rarely become tame. They 

 are peevish and sulky, resisting all attempts to coax them, and biting any one who 

 ventures within reach. They have no particular cry, even when in their native 

 woods ; in captivity they are quite silent. In the course of a few days or weeks, 

 if not carefully attended to, they fall into a listless condition, refuse food, and die. 

 Many of them succumb to a disease which I suppose from the symptoms to be 

 inflammation of the chest or lungs. The one which I kept as a pet died of this 

 disorder, after I had had it about three weeks. It lost its appetite in a very few 

 days, although kept in an airy verandah; its coat, which was orginally long, 

 smooth, and glossy, became dingy and ragged, like that of the specimens seen in 

 museums, and the bright scarlet colour of its face changed to a duller hue. This 

 colour, in health, is spread over the features up to the roots of the hair on the 

 forehead and temples, and down to the neck, including the flabby cheeks, which 

 hang down below the jaws. The animal in this condition looks, at a short distance, 

 as though some one had laid a thick coat of red paint on its countenance. The 

 death of my pet was slow; during the last twenty-four hours it lay prostrate, 

 breathing quickly, its chest slowly heaving ; the colour of its face became gradually 

 paler, but was still red when it expired. As the hue did not quite disappear until 

 two or three hours after the animal was quite dead, I judged that it was not exclus- 

 ively due to the blood, but partly to a pigment beneath the skin, which would 

 probably retain its colour a short time after the circulation had ceased. 



"After seeing much of the morose disposition of the uakari," continues Mr. 

 Bates, " I was not a little surprised one day at a friend's house to find an extremely 

 lively and familiar individual of this species. It ran from an inner chamber 

 straight towards me, after I had sat down on a chair, climbed my legs, and nestled 

 in my lap, turning round and looking up with the usual monkey's grin, after it 

 had made itself comfortable. It was a young animal, which had been taken 

 when its mother was shot with a poisoned arrow ; its teeth were incomplete, and the 



