CHAPTER IV 



THE TREE-CLIMBING GUENON MONKEYS 



I AM one of the tree-climbing monkeys, or, in other words, 

 I am arboreal. There are six kinds or species of us, but 

 we are all so closely related that we are classed by naturalists 

 under one genus. So naturalists, when referring to all of 

 us, say we are Cercopithecus monkeys. 



I will tell you the story of my particular tribe, because 

 I am the commonest of the lot. Every one of you know 

 our tribe. We are the little blue monkeys. The Dutch 

 people call us Blaauw-aapje. The Amaxosa and Zulu natives 

 know us as Inkau ; the Swazis as Ingobiyana ; the Basutos 

 as Inkalatshana ; amateur naturalists as the Vervet ; and 

 men of science as Cercopithecus fygerythrus. We are very 

 sociable monkeys and live together in big families of a dozen 

 to three or four hundred. We inhabit the forest lands of 

 the eastern parts of the Cape of Good Hope, along the 

 Orange and Vaal Rivers, Griqualand West, Pondoland, away 

 through Natal and Zululand, and into the Eastern Transvaal. 



Then there are our cousins, the baboons, of which there 

 are two kinds in South Africa. They, too, are Guenon 

 monkeys. Long ago, a French naturalist fellow came 

 along to South Africa, and because we made grimaces at 

 him he styled us Guenon monkeys. " Guenon " is a 

 French word which means " one who grimaces," so the 

 name has stuck to us like schoolboy nicknames often do. 

 Now, I want to have a sort of scientific talk with you. 

 We Guenon monkeys belong to a great family known as 

 the Cercopithecidae. We have a great army of first cousins. 



