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ANIMALS OF EGA 



animal, at a short distance, looks as though it held a ball 

 of snow-white cotton in its teeth. The last I shall men- 

 tion is the Hapale pygmseus, one of the most diminutive 

 forms of the monkey order. I obtained, near St. Paulo, 

 three full-grown specimens, which measured only seven 

 inches in length of body. The pretty Lilliputian face is 

 furnished with long brown whiskers, which are naturally 

 brushed back over the ears. The general colour of the 

 animal is brownish- tawny, but the tail is elegantly barred 

 with black. I was surprised, on my return to England, 

 to learn that the pigmy marmoset was found also in 

 Mexico, no other Amazonian monkey being known to 

 wander far from the great river plain. Thus the smallest, 

 and apparently the feeblest, species of the whole order, is 

 one which has, by some means, become the most widely 

 dispersed. 



The Jupurd. — A curious animal, known to naturalists 

 as the Kinkajou, but called Jupura by the Indians of the 

 Amazons, and considered by them as a kind of monkey, 

 may be mentioned in this place. It is the Cercoleptes 

 caudivolvus of zoologists, and has been considered by 

 some authors as an intermediate form between the Lemur 

 family of apes and the plantigrade Carnivora, or Bear 

 family. It has decidedly no close relationship to either 

 of the groups of American monkeys, having six cutting 

 teeth to each jaw, and long claws instead of nails, with 

 extremities of the usual shape of paws instead of hands. 

 Its muzzle is conical and pointed, like that of many 

 Lemurs of Madagascar ; the expression of its countenance, 

 and its habits and actions, are also very similar to those 

 of Lemurs. Its tail is very flexible towards the tip, and 

 is used to twine round branches in climbing. I did not 

 see or hear anything of this animal whilst residing on the 

 Lower Amazons, but on the banks of the Upper river, 

 from the Teffe to Peru, it appeared to be rather common. 

 It is nocturnal in its habits, like the owl-faced monkeys, 

 although, unlike them, it has a bright, dark eye. I once 

 saw it in considerable numbers, when on an excursion 

 with an Indian companion along the low Ygapo shores 

 of the Teffe, about twenty miles above Ega. We slept 

 one night at the house of a native family living in the 

 thick of the forest, where a festival was going on, and 

 there being no room to hang our hammocks under shelter, 

 on account of the number of visitors, we lay down on a 



