352 QUADRUMANA. 



which, within the last few years, have been exhibited in London, are 

 said to have been procured ; and in this manner, we are told, are the 

 young Baboons and Monkeys obtained, which stock our menageries. 

 The climate of England is uncongenial to the Simiadae ; and the observa- 

 tion also applies to all the more northern parts of Europe : some, how- 

 ever, bear it far better than others ; and several species have produced 

 young, not only in France, and the more temperate parts of the neigh- 

 bouring Continent, but even in England, a circumstance which has 

 occurred several times at the Gardens of the Zoological Society. Still 

 it is very evident, that our changeful climate is unfavourable to 

 their health : their constitution is peculiarly susceptible of transitions 

 from heat to cold ; and a wet and murky day evidently produces depress- 

 ing effects throughout all the tenants of the Monkey-house, who may 

 be seen huddled together, for the sake of warmth. Hence, without 

 much care and attention, few struggle through a severe winter ; fewer 

 survive two or three years ; and but a small proportion attain to the 

 natural term of their existence. One cannot help feeling a sort of sym- 

 pathy for them, the more especially as the disease, under which most 

 sicken and die, is pulmonary consumption ; the symptoms of which 

 correspond with those too often witnessed among our own species ; as 

 do, also, the morbid appearances of the lungs. 



The acquisition of the second, or permanent teeth, is a period of con- 

 siderable danger to the Simiadae : their development is accompanied by 

 much irritation of the system, and a great determination of blood to 

 the brain ; and numbers are suddenly carried off, unable to struggle 

 through the ordeal. It would appear to be during the growth of the 

 canine teeth that the greatest mischief arises ; and this the more so, in 

 proportion to the magnitude these teeth attain. In the large Baboons, 

 for example, whose canine teeth are enormous, and with huge fangs 

 deeply implanted in protuberant alveoli, the development of these parts 

 is often attended by violent convulsions, which usually have a fatal 

 termination. Of several young Mandrills which, from time to time, 

 have been brought under the Author's notice, not one survived this criti- 

 cal epoch. If a collection of the skulls of Monkeys, which have died 

 in our menageries, be examined, in a great proportion of them it will 

 be found that the canines are but partially evolved, and were, conse- 

 quently, in progress at the time of death. That the Simiadae, in their 

 free and natural condition, are much more exempt from this danger than 

 when kept in a state of confinement, and that, too, in an unpropitious 

 climate, may readily be imagined. 



Another disease, to which the Simiadae are subject, has not been 

 hitherto noticed by naturalists. It consists in a softening of the bones, 

 from the composition of which the calcareous particles are absorbed, or, 



