BABOONS 
T 33 
Habits. The habits of this species appear to bo very similar to those of its 
North African cousin, since we read that it goes in large troops, the 
members of which scramble up the rocks when their territories are invaded, and, 
having gained a safe refuge, seat themselves gravely down to gaze upon the strangers. 
In climbing up the rocky cliffs they are often much assisted by the tendrils of the 
creeping plants with which so many of the South African crags are clothed. Writing 
of the kind of scenery among which these animals dwell, the great African hunter, 
Gordon Cumming, says : “ I continued my march through a glorious country of hill 
and dale, throughout which water was abundant. Beautifully wooded hills and 
mountains stretched away on every side; some of the mountains were particularly 
THE CHACMA BABOON liat. size). 
grand and majestic, their summits being surrounded by steep precipices and abrupt 
parapets of rock, the abodes of whole colonies of black-faced baboons, which, 
astonished to behold such novel intruders upon their domains, leisurely descended 
the craggy mountain-sides for a nearer inspection of our caravan.” It is said that 
there are instances where these animals have rolled down stones from the heights 
on a passing caravan, although there is no proof that such missiles were not 
merely fragments of rock accidentally detached. 
The late Professor Moseley, who fell in with chacmas when at the Cape, 
during the Challenger expedition, states that they “ live especially about the sea- 
cliffs and steep slopes leading down from there to the sea; but they are to be met 
with also on the open moorland above. They live in droves or clans of thirty, 
