THE MONKE Y FAMIL Y. 



193 



weight. In a word, the voluntary return of the prisoner to its 

 keepers clearly proves, that it had entertained no animosity against 

 them ; and, of course, would never have thought of plying their 

 heads with tiles. 



" My reviewer's account of ' Happy Jerry, from the Guide-Book,' 

 is an obvious failure. He neither gives us the name of the person 

 who saw it kill the boy aboard the vessel, nor even the name of the 

 poor boy himself. Surely such an awful and unusual feat must be 

 on record somewhere. I blame the reviewer for not looking more 

 narrowly into this suspicious affair. Had he given names and dates, 

 I would have thought it worth my while to show that the death had 

 been caused by accident, and not by intention on the part of the 

 monkey. In its present form I dismiss it as an idle fabrication. 



" As for Vaillant's ape, let us call to mind that it was one 

 which had been reclaimed from the forest ; and, of course, its 

 tricks were all acquired from the time that it had kept company 

 with man. But Vaillant says nothing of his ever having actually seen 

 a wild monkey on the ground, engaged in pulling up herbs with its 

 teeth. No such thing. He knew better than to pawn such a fable 

 upon the public. In truth, he. would have us believe, that this 

 tame monkey of his was really endowed with reason, inasmuch as it 

 could discover, by some faculty or other never as yet granted by 

 Providence to the monkey family, that its master was particularly 

 fond of a certain root, very 'refreshing and excellent.' Now, 

 Vaillant's monkey, knowing this, took good care to have the first go 

 at the root ; and it devoured the savoury morsel before its master 

 could manage to lay his eager hand upon it ! This really places the 

 brute on a par with intellectual man himself. Let it be burnt for 

 trash in Don Quixote's library, or, at least, placed on the shelves of 

 my old grandmother's bookcase. It will suit the nursery maid, and 

 make the children laugh. 



" My reviewer tells his readers that, in his boyhood, he ' had his 

 eyes full of saw-dust,' in punishment, 'for having offered an apple or 

 a. nut, and snatching it away just as the disappointed monkey thought 

 it was within its grasp.' This borders on a fraud, if not a fraud out- 

 right ! The reviewer, combating my statement, viz., that no monkey 

 can hurl a projectile, evidently wishes us to believe that monkeys 



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