The Emporia news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1859-1881, 1880-09-24
MONKEY LIFE IN INDIA.
London Telegram,

In India, where the monkeys live
among men, and are the playmates of
their children, the Hindoos have grown
very fond of them, and the four-handed
folks participate in all their simple
household rites. In the early morning,
when the peasant goes out to yoke his
oxen, and the crow wakes up and the
dog stretches himself and shakes off the
dust in which he has slept all night, the
old monkey creeps down the peepul tree,
only half awake, and yawns and looks
about him, puts straw in his mouth,
and scratches himself contemplatively.
Then one by one the whole family come
slipping down the tree trunk, and they
all yawn and look about and scratch.
But they are sleepy and peevish and
the youngsters get cuffed for nothing
and begin to think life dull. Yet the
toilet has to be performed, and,
whether they like it or not
the young ones are sternly pulled
up, one by one, to their mother, to I'M
dergo the process. The scene, though
repeated exactly every morning, loses
nothing of its comicality, and the mon
key brats seem to be in the joke of
taking in mamma" But mamma was
young herself not SO very long ago, and
treats every ludicrous affection of suf-
fering with the profouniest unconcern,
and as she dismisses one cleaned"
youngster with cuff, stretches out her
hand for the next ones tail or leg in the
most business-like and serious manner
possible. The youngsters know their
turns quite well. AS each feels the mo-
ment arriving it throws itself on its
stomach as if overwhelmed with appre-
hension, the others meanwhile sitting
their satisfaction at the capital way $50
and so is doing it," and the instant the
maternal paw is extended to grasp the
tail the subject OF the next, experiment
utters a piercing shrek; and throwing
its arms forward in the dust, allows it.
self to be dragged along, a limp and
helpless carcass winking all the time, no
doubt, at its sisters and brothers, at the
way it is imposing on the old lady. But
the old lady will stand no nonsense, and
turning the child right side up, proceeds
to put it to rights, takes the kinks out
of its tail and the knots out of its fur
pokes its fingers into its ears and looks
at each of its toes, the irrepressible brat
all the time wearing an absurd expires
sion of hopeless and incurable grief
those who have been already cleanseC
looking on with delight at the screaming
farce and those who are waiting wearing
a becoming aspect of enormous gravity
The old lady, however, has her joke, too
which is to cuff each yOungster before
she lets it go; and nimble as her of
springs are generally, to her credit be i
said, manages to "fetch them one on thu
ears before they are out of reach. Thu
father, meanwhile, sits gravely, with hi
back tn all these domestic matters, wait
ing for breakfast. Presently the mat
before the hut doors are pushed down
and women, with brass vessels in thei
hands, come out, and while they scou
the pots and pans with dust, exchang
between songs the compliments of tn
morning. The monkeys by this tim
have come close to the preparations TO
food, and sit solemnly,. household b.
household, watching every movement
Hindoos do not hurry themselves IN any
thing they do, butthe monkey has plent
of patience, and in the end, when th
crow has stolen a little, and the dog la
had his morsel, and the children are Al
satisfied, the poor fragments of the mes
are thrown out on the ground for ID
"bhunder ogue," the monkey people, an
it is soon discussed, the mother feedin
the baby before she herself eats.