on-wood
(_Populus angulata_), enabled them to execute this movement freely.

The oscillation continued to increase until the monkey at the end of the
chain was thrown among the branches of a tree on the opposite bank.
Here, after two or three vibrations, he clutched a limb and held fast.
This movement was executed adroitly, just at the culminating point of
the "swing", in order to save the intermediate links from the violence
of a too sudden jerk.

The chain was now fast at both ends, forming a complete
suspension-bridge, over which the whole troop, to the number of four or
five hundred, passed with the rapidity of thought.

It was one of the most comical sights I ever beheld, to witness the
quizzical expression of countenances along that living chain. To see
the mothers, too, making the passage, with their tiny infants clinging
to their backs, was a sight at once comical and curious.

The monkeys that formed the chain kept up an incessant talking, and, as
we fancied, _laughing_, and frequently they would bite at the legs of
the individuals passing over, as if to hurry them on!

The troop was soon on the other side; but how were the animals forming
the bridge to get themselves over? This was the question that suggested
itself. Manifestly, thought we, by number one letting go his tail. But
then the _point d'appui_ on the other side was much lower down, and
number one, with half a dozen of his neighbours, would be dashed against
the opposite bank, or soused into the water.

Here, then, was a problem, and we waited with some curiosity for its
solution.

It was soon solved. A monkey was now seen attaching his tail to the
lowest on the bridge; another girdled him in a similar manner, and
another, and so on until a dozen more were added to the string. These
last were all powerful fellows; and running up to a high limb, they
lifted the bridge into a position almost horizontal.

Then a scream from the last monkey of the new formation warned the _tail
end_ that all was ready; and the next moment the whole chain was swung
over, and landed safely on the opposite bank!

The lowermost links now dropped off to the ground, while the higher ones
leaped to the branches and came down by the trunk. The whole troop then
scampered off into the chaparral and disappeared.

"Aw, be the powers of Moll Kelly! iv thim little crayteurs hasn't more
sinse than the humans av these parts! It's a quare counthry, anyhow.
Be me sowl!