296 NATURAL HISTORY OF AFRICA. 



colouring of the coat of various animals. It was applied 

 by Greek authors, some centuries posterior to the time of 

 Homer, to certain monkeys, and is now used specifically to 

 distinguish the species in question. M. Adanson informs 

 us that the woods of Podor, along the river Niger, are filled 

 with green monkeys. He could discover them only by the 

 branches which they cast down from the tops of the trees ; 

 for they were otherwise so silent, as well as nimble, that he 

 could scarcely obtain a glimpse of them in their natural po- 

 sitions. After he had shot two or three, the rest became 

 alanned, and endeavoured to shelter themselves behind the 

 trunks and larger branches. Some descended to the ground ; 

 but the greater number of those that remained unwounded, 

 sprung with great activity from the top of one tree to an- 

 other. " During this operation," says the traveller, " I 

 continued to shoot, and in the space of twenty fathoms I 

 killed twenty-three m less than an hour, and not one of 

 them uttered the smallest cry, though they frequently as- 

 sembled in troops, grinded their teeth, and assumed a 

 threatening aspect, as if they meant to attack me." 



The white-nosed monkey {Cercopithecus petaurista of 

 Pesmarets) inhabits the coast of Guinea. When taken 

 young it is easily tamed, and is then exceedingly lively and 

 diverting. The adult animals in the wild state are cunning 

 and fierce, and avoid the vicinity of mankind. 



The amount of species in this order of animals is so 

 great, that, even confined as we are to those of a single 

 continent, a volume would scarcely suffice for the most su- 

 perficial sketch of their history, were we to include the 

 whole of the African species. We must therefore be very 

 brief in what remains to be told of one or two additional 

 kinds. Next to the magot or Barbary ape, one of the best 

 known in Europe is the mona or varied monkey. It is 

 native to the northern parts of Africa, and appears to have 

 been known to the Greeks under the name of kebos. This 

 species is of an affectionate nature in confinement, and is 

 more than usually susceptible of education. Some consider 

 him synonymous with the Abyssinian ape described by 

 Ludolphe, which that author saw in great troops turning 

 over stones, with entomological zeal, in search of worms 

 and insects. 



It was probably a species allied to that last mentioned in 



