192 THE SPEECH OF MONKEYS. 



danger his life. Schomburgsk ordered the animal to be 

 shot, but as an attendant approached the cage with a 

 gun, the culprit showed the greatest consternation, fled 

 into the sleeping apartment of the cage, and could not 

 be induced by any offer of tempting food to come out of 

 this place of refuge. It must be added that the monkeys 

 were perfectly accustomed to fire-arms, which had been 

 frequently used for killing rats near the cage, and that 

 they had never manifested the slightest fear of them. 

 Even now the other monkeys ate their food as usual, 

 with a conscience void of offense. No sooner had the 

 man with the gun withdrawn and concealed himself 

 than the old monkey sneaked out, and snatching some 

 of the food, rushed back into his asylum, but when he 

 tried to repeat this experiment, a keeper closed the door 

 from without, and thus cut off his retreat. As the man 

 with the gun drew near again, the poor monkey seemed 

 quite beside himself with terror. He first tried to open 

 the sliding-door, then ran into every nook and corner of 

 the cage in search of some way of escape, and finally, in 

 despair, threw himself flat on the floor and awaited his 

 fate, which soon overtook him. 



Let us compare with such facts the statement for in- 

 stance of one of the ablest and most devoted mission- 

 aries, Morlang, who without any success at all worked 

 for many years among the ape-like negro tribes along 

 the upper Nile. He said : " Among such savages every 

 mission is utterly useless. They stand far below brutes, 

 as the latter show at least signs of affection towards 

 those who are kind to them, while those beastly natives 

 are totally devoid of any feelings of gratitude." Other 

 travelers have expressed their opinion in similar ways 

 and even stated that if a dividing line must be drawn, it 

 ought to be established between the most highly civil- 

 ized portion of mankind on one side, and those savage 

 tribes on the other, so that the latter would be, and not 



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