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V E It T E B 11 ATA 



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M. DUVAUCEL SHOOTING MONKEYS IN INDIA. 



be no question that they had either some business or pleasure on hand; and the fact of each 

 carrying a stick, led us to conclude that it was the former upon which they were bent. Their 

 destination was, like ours, evidently Deobund, where there arc some hundreds of monkeys fed by 

 a number of Brahmins, who live near a Hindoo temple there, and perform religious ceremonies. 

 They — this monkey regiment — would not get out of the road on our account, nor disturb them- 

 selves in any war ; and my friend was afraid to drive through their ranks, or over any of them, 

 for when assailed they are most ferocious brutes, and armed as they were, and in such mini 

 they could have annihilated us with the greatest ease. There was no help for us, therefore, but 

 to let the mare proceed at a walk in the rear of the tribe, the members of which, now that we 

 were Hearing Deobund, began to chatter frightfully. Just before we came to the bungalow, they 

 left the road and took the direction of the temple. Fain would we have followed them, but to 

 so in the buggy would have been impossible, for they crossed over some very rough ground and 

 two ditches. My friend, therefore, requested the sowars to follow them, and report all they might 

 observe of their actions. Meanwhile, we moved off to the bungalow; on arriving at which, we men- 

 tioned to the proprietor, a very old but active and intelligent man, the sight we had seen on th< 

 i the regiment of monke* -. 



" 'Ah !' exclaimed the old man, 'it is about the time. 



■• 'What time?' 



- • Well, Sahib, about every five years that tribe comes up the country to pay a visit to this, 

 place; and another tribe comes aboul the same time from the up-country — the hills. They meet 

 in a jungle behind the old Hindoo temple, and there embrace each other as though they were 

 human beings and old fri< uds who had been parted for a length of time.- I have seen in that 

 jungle as many as four or five thousand. The Brahmins say that one large tribe comes all the. 



