ce we could obtain a view up
and down for some distance.

We had just reached the bank, and were looking out along it, when I saw
a troop of monkeys coming along through the forest. I kept True by my
side, and whispered to Arthur not to speak. I could scarcely help
laughing aloud at the odd manner in which they made their way among the
branches, now swinging down by their tails, now catching another branch,
and hanging on by their arms. They were extraordinarily thin creatures,
with long arms and legs, and still longer tails--our old friends the
spider monkeys. Those tails of theirs were never quiet, but kept
whisking about in all directions. They caught hold of the branches with
them, and then hung by them with their heads downwards, an instant
afterwards to spring up again. Presently they came close to the water,
when one of them caught hold of a branch with his fore-hands and tail,
another jumped down and curled his tail round the body of the first. A
third descended and slung himself in a similar manner. A fourth and
fifth followed, and so on; and there they hung, a regular monkey chain.
Immediately the lowest, who hung with his head downwards, gave a shove
with his fore-paws, and set the chain swinging, slowly at first but
increasing in rapidity, backwards and forwards over the water. I
thought to myself, if an alligator were making his way up the canal, the
lowest would have a poor chance of his life. The swinging increased in
violence, till the lowest monkey got his paws round the slender trunk of
a tree on the opposite side. Immediately he drew his companion after
him; till the next above him was within reach of it. That one caught
the tree in the same way, and they then dragged up their end of the
chain till it hung almost horizontally across the water. A living
bridge having thus been formed, the remainder of the troop, chiefly
consisting of young monkeys who had been amusing themselves meantime
frisking about in the branches, ran over. Two or three of the
mischievous youngsters took the opportunity of giving a sly pinch to
their elders, utterly unable just then to retaliate; though it was
evident, from the comical glances which the latter cast at them, that
the inflictors of the pinches were not unnoticed. One, who had been
trying to catch some fish apparently during the interval, was nearly too
late to cross. The first two who had got across now climbed still
further up the trunk; and when th