THE JUPURA 



451 



mat in the open air, near a shed which stood in the midst 

 of a grove of fruit-trees and pupunha palms. After mid- 

 night, when all became still, after the uproar of holiday- 

 making, as I was listening to the dull, fanning sound 

 made by the wings of impish hosts of vampire bats crowd- 

 ing round the Caju trees, a rustle commenced from the 

 side of the woods, and a troop of slender, long-tailed 

 animals were seen against the clear moonlit sky, taking 

 flying leaps from branch to branch through the grove. 

 Many of them stopped at the pupunha trees, and the hust- 

 ling, twittering, and screaming, with sounds of falling fruits, 

 showed how they were employed. I thought, at first, 

 they were Nyctipitheci, but they proved to be Jupuras, 

 for the owner of the house early next morning caught a 

 young one, and gave it to me. I kept this as a pet animal 

 for several weeks, feeding it on bananas and mandioca- 

 meal mixed with treacle. It became tame in a very 

 short time, allowing itself to be caressed, but making a 

 distinction in the degree of confidence it showed between 

 myself and strangers. My pet was unfortunately killed 

 by a neighbour's dog, which entered the room where it 

 was kept. The animal is so difficult to obtain alive, its 

 place of retreat in the daytime not being known to the 

 natives, that I was unable to procure a second living 

 specimen. 



As I shall not have occasion again to enter on the 

 subject of monkeys, a few general remarks will be here 

 in place, as a summary of my observations on this im- 

 portant order of animals in the Amazons region. The 

 total number of species of monkeys which I found in- 

 habiting the margins of the Upper and Lower Amazons, 

 was thirty-eight. They belonged to twelve different 

 genera, forming two distinct families, the number of 

 genera and families, here as well as in other orders of 

 animals or plants, expressing roughly the amount of 

 diversity existing with regard to forms. All the New 

 World genera of apes, except one (Eriodes, closely allied 

 to the Coaitas, but having claw-shaped nails to the 

 fingers), are represented in the Amazons region. With 

 these ample materials before us, let us draw a comparison 

 between the monkeys of the new continent, and their 

 kindred of the Old World. It seems highly probable 

 that the larger land areas, both continents and islands. 



