THE MONKEY FAMILY. 



19 



Let us return to monkeys in general. 



It is far from my intention to uphold or patronise 

 the tricks and movements of these animals, when 

 under the command or tutelage of civilized man. 

 Such antics have nothing to do with the real 

 character of monkeys in their wild domains. 



Innumerable are the narratives, in modern and 

 in ancient books, of gentleness in the apes, of 

 ferocity in the baboons, and of playfulness in all 

 of the tribe, from the orang-outang down to the 

 little black sacawinki, no larger than a rat, in the 

 interminable forests of Guiana. 



These amusing anecdotes, in support of the mar- 

 vellous, may all be very well to frighten children 

 or to make them laugh : but, like Martin Luther's 

 reformation, they are not orthodox. 



Then again, there has been a general and a great 

 mistake on the part of those who have written on 

 monkeys; that is, those writers have seldom, or 

 ever, studied their habits in the localities in which 

 nature has commanded them to move. 



This blunder has placed the whole family in 

 anything but the real and necessary point of view. 

 Thus, in our own events, when the sun was believed 

 to roll round the earth, and rose every morning, 

 "roseis sol surgit ab undis," and went to bed regu- 

 larly every night, "oeciduis absconditur undis," the 



F 2 



