ANTHROPOID APES. 519 



employ the hind-limbs in the same way as they can the fore ones ; 

 but it is hardly a correct definition, for this species of mammal is 

 not four-handed, if we accept the meaning of the word hand as 

 signifying a somewhat similar organ to the one with which human 

 beings are supplied. However it was adopted by many naturalists, 

 and is still employed by nearly all writers on natural history. 



The varieties of monkeys, including marmosets and the half-apes 

 or lemurs, are almost endless. Some are beautiful animals. Some 

 are quite the reverse, hideously ugly. Some are intelligent, others 

 stupid, some live in trees, others on rocks. There are silent 

 monkeys and chattering monkeys, laughing monkeys and howling 

 monkeys. Some are affectionate, some savage, and some animals 

 have cheek-pouches, which are receptacles within the mouth where 

 nuts or other food can be stored till required, but all the animals 

 so supplied come from the old world. Some monkeys have pre- 

 hensile tails, but whenever one is seen it can safely be set down 

 as an American animal. The old-world monkeys have a narrow 

 septum or division separating the nostrils, while the various 

 species found in the new world have a broad division ; and there 

 are other easily recognized physical distinctions between the two 

 races. 



The monkeys most generally known are the small, gentle, 

 affectionate little animals to be seen led about by strolling 

 musicians. They are nearly all of the genus sapajou, or Capu- 

 chin monkeys, and come from the tropical forests of South 

 America, where they live congregated in troops or flocks. 



These gigantic forests are the true homes of the monkey family, 

 for therein they can travel hundreds of miles by simply jumping or 

 swinging from tree to tree. The extent of their domain is stated by 

 ' Mr. Bates ^ to have been, at the time he visited South America, 1260 

 miles from west to east, and, with grassy intervals, continuing in this 

 latter direction for 700 miles further. " But," he adds, " as there 

 is no complete break of continuity, the statement of Humboldt 

 (who had a glimpse of the immeasurable wilderness only from its 

 western commencement in Peru) still holds good, to the effect that 

 a flock of monkeys might travel amongst the tree-tops, were it not 

 J See " ITotes on Animal Life in a Primeeval Forest," in Good Words for 1864. 



