thought itself concealed, but had forgotten its dependent tail. The tiny creature is to-day “the new boy” of the school, and, as yet, has found his comrades rude and unsympathetic.
They ask his sisters’ names, and where he came from, how old he is, and what he can do; and whatever his answer may be, the rejoinder is much the same, either a pinch or a push, a tug at his tail, or a box on the ear. So, as the keeper says, “whenever he sees one coming towards him he just sits down and hollers; but he’ll get used to it. They all hollers a bit at first.”
But the grivet after all is only going to scratch the capuchin, in a sociable sort of way, for they are most of them sociable, and a pleasing community of fur obtains among them.
But you must not watch a monkey too long at a time, or it will be certain to abuse your curiosity by flippant conduct, and the illusion of respectability will be at once destroyed. Turn for a moment to any family of monkeys, and for a time nothing can be more becoming than their behavior. The young ones romp, while the old one, discountenancing such frivolity, sits severely on a perch, turning every now and then to look out wistfully over the spectators’ heads at the bright sun shining out of doors. But on a sudden a change comes over the scene. A young one, grovelling under the straw, forgets that it has left its tail protruding, and the temptation is greater than the old one can resist. In a twinkling the challenge to a romp is accepted; and lo! while the senior makes a fool of himself among the straw with one of the children, the other child is on his perch, looking just as grave as he did, and gazing at intervals in the same wistful way out into the open air. The old monkey,
