Gerald Durrell Read Online Free PDF Page A

indicated,
drifting as silently as possible through the undergrowth. I remembered suddenly
that I had my field-glasses with me, and cursing myself for a fool, I unslung
them and trained them on the tree-tops. I gazed up at the shimmering ocean of
leaves without success, feeling unreasonably irritated that both my hunters
could obviously see and hear the monkeys, while I, even with my field-glasses,
could not see a living thing. Then, suddenly, out of a mass of leaves along a
great black branch, trouped a delightful procession. The first monkey was an
old male, his tail crooked over his back, peering from side to side as he
walked out along the branch. He was coal black, with the tips of the fur on his
back tinged with green, so that he had a speckled appearance. His chest was
white, and on his little black face the area on and around his nose was white
also, a large heart-shaped patch as glistening white as a snowball. The hair on
his head was long, and stood up straight, so that he looked not unlike a
golliwog stalking disdainfully through the branches. Close on his heels came
his two wives, both smaller than he, and both very timid, for they had young.
The first carried a minute replica of herself slung at her breast. He was as
small as a newly born kitten, and he hung under his mother’s body, his long
arms wrapped round her and his small hands clasping tight to the fur on her
back. The other baby was older and walked cautiously behind his mother, peering
fearfully down at the great drop below him, and uttering a plaintive cheeping
cry. I was captivated by these babies, and as I watched them I made up my mind
that I would get hold of some baby Putty-nose Guenon if I had to spend the rest
of my life at it.
     

    “Masa go shoot?”
came a hoarse whisper from Elias, and lowering the glasses, I found him
offering me the shotgun. For a moment I was angry that he should suggest firing
at that charming family, with their golliwog heads and their white clowns’ noses.
But I realized it would be impossible to explain my reasons to these men: in
the Cameroon forest sentimental feelings are the luxury of the well-fed. In
such a place meat is hard to come by and every ounce worth its weight in gold,
therefore aesthetic feelings come a very poor second to a protein-hungry body.
     
    “No, Elias, I no
go shoot,” I said, and turned my glasses back to the tree-tops, but my little
family had disappeared. “Elias?”
     
    “Sah?”
     
    “You tell men
for village I go pay five shillings for one picken of that kind of monkey . . .
you hear?”
     
    “I hear, sah,”
said Elias, brightening visibly.
     
    We continued our
erratic way between the tree trunks, and presently came to the banks of a small
stream which gurgled its way pleasantly over its shallow bed. The banks were
spongy and wet, covered with a thick growth of large-leafed plants, green and
succulent. We were wading through this waist-high growth, following the course
of the river, when Elias suddenly leapt in the air with a yelp, and shouted,
“Shoot, Masa, shoot. . . .” There was a great commotion going on ahead of me,
but I could see nothing to shoot at, except Andraia, who was hopping about in
the undergrowth like a lanky grasshopper, uttering cries of “Eh . . . aehh!”
Judging by the noise, some large animal was hidden in the greenery, but as it
was thick enough to conceal anything from a leopard to a full-sized gorilla, I
was not quite sure what to expect. Suddenly the animals broke cover, and I
stood there gaping in amazement as a fully grown pair of Red River Hogs fled,
zigzagging through the trees. They were the most vivid orange colour with long
white tufts on their ears, and a flowing mane of white hair along their backs.
They were quite the most startling and beautiful members of the pig family I
had ever seen, arid I gazed after them open-mouthed. They disappeared with
extraordinary rapidity into the forest. Elias and Andraia seemed to take rather
a dim