of the Old World. 191 



old dilapidated pagoda, on the walls of which some 

 scores of the common green tufted monkey sat grin- 

 ning, jabbering, and making mouths at us, as we 

 passed. 



A curious tale is told of a detachment of the th 

 Native Infantry having made a colony of these 

 monkeys revenge an insult which was offered them 

 by the inhabitants of Trippasore, the greater part of 

 whom consist of Brahmins. It appears that the 

 military were en route to the Presidency, escorting 

 treasure, and the Bunnias, or grain-sellers, raised the 

 price of rice very considerably the day before they 

 passed through their town, which conduct aroused 

 Jack Sepoy's indignation, who, however, smothered 

 his resentment until his return from Madras, when 

 each man filled his haversack with rice and dhal (a 

 kind of sweet bean), and on repassing through the 

 town he threw it on the roofs of all the tiled houses, 

 on which lived hundreds of monkeys, occasioning a 

 most ludicrous scene for immediately the tiles were 

 seen flying in clouds into the streets, until the greater 

 part of the town was unroofed; for the monkeys, 

 finding the grains slip under the tiles, lifted them up, 

 and threw them into the street, and as they took 

 one up the rice slipped under the next, and so on, 

 until a good roof was demolished in a few minutes, to 

 the utter disgust and mortification of the Brahmins, 

 who dare not molest the monkeys, considering these 



