of large dimensions and
fierce countenance, which at that moment rudely thrust the melancholy
monkey aside, and took its place. The latter, with a humble air and
action, took up a new position, somewhat nearer to the fire, where its
sad countenance was more distinctly seen.

"Well, it does seem a particularly sorrowful monkey, that," said Harold,
laughing, as he helped himself to another canful of tea.

"The most miserable objic' I ever did see," observed Disco.

The negroes looked at each other and laughed. They were accustomed to
monkeys, and took little notice of them, but they were mightily tickled
by Disco's amusement, for he had laid down his knife and fork, and shook
a good deal with internal chuckling, as he gazed upwards.

"One would suppose, now," he said softly, "that it had recently seen its
father and mother, and all its brothers and sisters, removed by a
violent death, or sold into slavery."

"Ha! they never see that," said Harold; "the brutes may fight and kill,
but they never _enslave_ each other. It is the proud prerogative of man
to do that."

"That's true, sir, worse luck, as Paddy says," rejoined Disco. "But
look there: wot's them coorious things round the creetur's waist--a pair
o' the werry smallest hands--and, hallo! a face no bigger than a button!
I do believe that it's--"

Disco did not finish the sentence, but he was right. The small
melancholy monkey was a mother!

Probably that was the cause of its sorrow. It is a touching thought
that anxiety for its tiny offspring perhaps had furrowed that monkey's
visage with the wrinkles of premature old age. That danger threatened
it on every side was obvious, for no sooner had it taken up its new
position, after its unceremonious ejection by the fierce monkey, than
the sprightly monkey, before referred to, conceived a plot which it
immediately proceeded to carry into execution. Observing that the tail
of the sad one hung down in a clear space below the branch on which it
sat, the sprightly fellow quickly, but with intense caution and silence,
crept towards it, and when within a yard or so sprang into the air and
caught the tail!

A wild shriek, and what Disco styled a "scrimmage," ensued, during which
the mother monkey gave chase to him of the lively visage, using her
arms, legs, and tail promiscuously to grasp and hold on to branches, and
leaving her extremely little one to look out for itself. This it seemed
quite capable of doing,