j8o 
APES AND MONKEYS. 
contrast between these colours and the vivid scarlet of the naked part of the face 
must be very striking when the animal is alive; but, owing to the fugitive nature 
of the face-pigment, all this is lost in museum specimens. 
This monkey has an extremely limited distribution, being found only on the 
left bank of the Amazon, in the neighbourhood of Ega; its small area being 
limited to the east by the River Japura, and to the west by the Putumayo, or lea, 
as it is often called. Mr. Bates states that in this area the uakari “ lives in small 
troops amongst the crowns of the lofty trees, subsisting on fruits of various kinds. 
Hunters say it is pretty nimble in its motions, but is not much given to leaping, 
preferring to run up and down the larger boughs in travelling from tree to tree. 
The mother, as in the other species of the monkey order, carries her young on her 
back. Individuals are obtained alive by shooting them with the blow-pipe and 
arrows tipped with diluted urari poison. They run a considerable distance after 
being pierced, and it requires an experienced hunter to track them. He is 
considered the most expert who can keep pace with a wounded one, and catch it 
in his arms when it falls exhausted. A pinch of salt, the antidote to the poison, 
is then put into its mouth, and the creature revives. The species is rare, even in the 
limited district which it inhabits. 
“ Adult uakaris, caught in the way described, very rarely become tame. They 
are peevish and sulky, resisting all attempts to coax them, and biting any one who 
ventures within reach. They have no particular cry, even when in their native 
woods; in captivity they are quite silent. In the course of a few days or weeks, 
if not carefully attended to, they fall into a listless condition, refuse food, and die. 
Many of them succumb to a disease which I suppose from the symptoms to be 
inflammation of the chest or lungs. The one which I kept as a pet died of this 
disorder, after I had had it about three weeks. It lost its appetite in a very few 
days, although kept in an airy verandah; its coat, which was orginally long, 
smooth, and glossy, became dingy and ragged, like that of the specimens seen in 
museums, and the bright scarlet colour of its face changed to a duller hue. This 
colour, in health, is spread over the features up to the roots of the hair on the 
forehead and temples, and down to the neck, including the flabby cheeks, which 
hang down below the jaws. The animal in this condition looks, at a short distance, 
as though some one had laid a thick coat of red paint on its countenance. The 
death of my pet was slow; during the last twenty-four hours it lay prostrate, 
breathing quickly, its chest slowly heaving; the colour of its face became gradually 
paler, but was still red when it expired. As the hue did not quite disappear until 
two or three hours after the animal was quite dead, I judged that it was not exclus¬ 
ively due to the blood, but partly to a pigment beneath the skin, which would 
probably retain its colour a short time after the circulation had ceased. 
“ After seeing much of the morose disposition of the uakari,” continues Mr. 
Bates, “ I was not a little surprised one day at a friend’s house to find an extremely 
lively and familiar individual of this species. It ran from an inner chamber 
straight towards me, after I had sat down on a chair, climbed my legs, and nestled 
in my lap, turning round and looking up with the usual monkey’s grin, after it 
had made itself comfortable. It was a young animal, which had been taken 
when its mother was shot with a poisoned arrow; its teeth were incomplete, and the 
