Mansfield Parkyns asserts that the cleverness of these Baboons depends in some measure upon 
their power of reason, and not entirely on that instinct with which all animals are endowed, and which 
serves them only to procure the necessaries of life and to defend themselves against their enemies. In 
proof he relates an anecdote, of which he was an eye-witness. “ At Khartum, the capital of the 
provinces of Upper Nubia, I saw a man showing a large male and two females of this breed, who per- 
formed several clever tricks at his command. I entered into conversation with him as to their sagacity, 
the mode of teaching them, and various other topics relating to them. Speaking of his male Monkey, 
he said that he was the most dexterous thief imaginable, and that every time he was exhibited he 
142 
NATURAL HISTORY. 
A VILLAGE IN NUBIA. 
stole dates and other provisions sufficient for his food for the day. In proof of this he begged me to 
watch him for a few minutes. I did so, and presently the keeper led him to a spot where a date-seller 
was sitting on the ground with his basket beside him. Here his master put him through his evolutions, 
and although I could perceive that the Monkey had an eye to the fruit, yet so completely did he dis- 
guise his intentions, that no careless observer would have noticed it. He did not at first appear to 
care about approaching the basket, but gradually brought himself nearer and nearer, till at last he got 
quite close to the owner. In the middle of one of his feats he suddenly started up from the ground on 
which he was lying sketched out like a corpse, and uttering a cry as if in pain or rage, fixed his eyes 
full on the face of the date-seller, and then, without moving the rest of his body, stole as many dates 
as he could hold in one of Iris hind hands. The date man, being stared out of countenance, and his 
attention diverted by this extraordinary movement, knew nothing about the theft till a bystander told 
him of it, and then he joined heartily in the laugh that was raised against him. The Monkey having 
