Apes and Monkeys: Their Life and Language

by R. L. Garner

Another habit that Moses had was putting his fingers in the dish to help himself. He had to be watched all the time to prevent this, and seemed unable to grasp any reason why he should not be allowed to do so. He always appeared to think my spoon, knife, and fork were better than his own. On one occasion he persisted in begging for my fork until I gave it to him. He dipped it into his soup, held it up, and looked at it as if disappointed. He again stuck it into his soup. Then he examined it, as if to see how I lifted my food with it. He did not seem to notice that I used it in lifting meat instead of soup. After repeating this three or four times he licked the fork, smelt it, and then deliberately threw it on the floor,—as if to say, “That’s a failure.” He then leaned over and drank his soup from the plate.

The only thing that he cared much to play with was a tin can in which I kept some nails. For this he had a kind of mania. He never tired of trying to remove the lid. When given the hammer and a nail, he knew what they were for, and would set to work to drive the nail into the floor of the cage or into the table; but he hurt his fingers a few times, and after that he stood the nail on its flat head, removed his fingers, and struck it with the hammer; but of course he never succeeded in driving it into anything.

A bunch of sugarcane was kept for Moses to eat when he wanted it. To aid him in tearing the hard shell away from it, I kept a club to bruise it. Sometimes he would go and select a stalk of cane, carry it to the block, take the club in both hands, and try to mash the cane; but as the jar of the stroke often hurt his hands, he learned to avoid this by letting go as the club descended. He never succeeded in crushing the cane, but would continue his efforts until some one came to his aid. At other times he would drag a stalk of the cane to the cage and poke it through the wires, then bring the club and poke it through to get me to mash the cane for him.

From time to time I received newspapers sent me from home. Moses could not understand what induced me to sit holding that thing before me, but he wished to try it and see. He would take a leaf of it, and hold it up before him with both hands, just as he saw me do; but instead of looking at the paper, he kept his eyes, most of the time, on me. When I turned my paper over, he did the same thing with his, but half the time it was upside down. He did not appear to care for the pictures, or notice them, except a few times he tried to pick them off the paper. One large cut of a dog’s head, when held at a short distance from him, he appeared to regard with a little interest, as if he recognized it as that of an animal of some kind; but I cannot say just what his ideas concerning it really were.

Chimpanzees are not usually so playful or so funny as monkeys, but they have a certain degree of mirth in their nature, and at times display a marked sense of humor. Moses was fond of playing peek-a-boo. He did not try to conceal his body from view, but put his head behind a box or something to hide his eyes. Then he would cautiously peep at me. He would often put his head behind one of the large tin boxes in the cage, leaving his whole body visible. In this attitude he would utter a peculiar sound, then draw his head out and look to see if I were watching him. If not, he would repeat the act a few times and then resort to some other means of amusing himself. But if he could gain attention the romp began. He found great pleasure in this simple pastime. He would roll over, kick up his heels, and grin with evident delight. His favorite hour for this sport was in the early part of the afternoon. I spent much time in entertaining him in this way and in many others, feeling amply repaid by the gratification it afforded him. I could not resist his overtures to play, as he was my only companion; and, living in that solitary manner, we found mutual pleasure in such diversions.

Another occasion on which he used to peep at me was when he lay down to take his midday nap. For this I had made him a little hammock. It was suspended by wires hooked in the top of my cage, so as to be removable when not in use. I always hung this near me, so I could swing him to sleep like a child. He liked this very much, and I liked equally well to indulge him in it. When he was laid in this little hammock, he was usually covered up with a small piece of canvas, and in spreading it over him I sometimes laid the edge of it over his eyes. But this caused him to suspect me of having some motive in doing so. Then he would reach his finger up, catch the edge of the cloth and gently draw it down, so as to see what I was doing. If he found that he was detected, he quickly released the cloth, and cuddled down as though he had drawn it down by accident; but the little rogue knew just as well as I did that it was not fair to peep.

I also made him another hammock, which was hung a few yards from the cage. It was intended that he should get into this without bothering me. But he did not seem to care for it, until I brought a young gorilla to live with us in our jungle home. As Moses had never used this hammock, I assigned it to the new member of the household. Whenever the gorilla got into the hammock there was a small row about it. Moses would never allow him to occupy it in peace. He seemed to know that it was his own by right, and the gorilla was regarded as an intruder. He would push and shove the gorilla, grunt and whine and quarrel until he got him out of it. But after doing so he would leave the hammock and climb up into the bushes, or go scouting about, hunting something to eat. He only wanted to dispossess the intruder, for whom he nursed an inordinate jealousy. He never went about the gorilla’s little house, which was near another side of my cage. Even after the gorilla died Moses kept aloof from its house.

As a rule, I took Moses with me in my rambles into the forest, and I found him to be quite useful in one way. His eyes were like the lens of a camera; nothing escaped them. When he discovered anything in the jungle, he always made it known by a peculiar sound. He could not point it out with his finger, but by watching his eyes the object could often be located. Frequently during these tours the ape rode on my shoulders. At other times the boy carried him; but occasionally he was put down on the ground to walk. If we traveled at a very slow pace, and allowed him to stroll along at leisure, he was content to do so; but if hurried beyond a certain gait, he always made a display of temper. He would turn on the boy and attack him if possible; but if the boy escaped, the angry little ape would throw himself down on the ground, scream, kick, and beat the earth with his own head and hands, in the most violent and persistent manner. He sometimes did the same way when not allowed to have what he wanted. His conduct was exactly like that of a spoiled or ugly child.

He had a certain amount of ingenuity, and often evinced a degree of reason which was rather unexpected. It was not a rare thing for him to solve some problem that involved a study of cause and effect, but this was always in a limited degree. I would not be understood to mean that he could work out any abstract problem, such as belongs to the realm of mathematics, but only simple, concrete problems, the object of which was present.

On one occasion while walking through the forest, we came to a small stream of water. The boy and myself stepped across it, leaving Moses to get over without help. He disliked getting his feet wet, and paused to be lifted across. We walked a few steps away and waited. He looked up and down the branch to see if there was any way to avoid it. He walked back and forth a few yards, but found no way to cross. He sat down on the bank and declined to wade. After a few moments he waddled along the bank about ten or twelve feet to a clump of tall, slender bushes growing by the edge of the stream. Here he halted, whined, and looked up thoughtfully into them. At length he began to climb one of them that leaned over the water. As he climbed up, the stalk bent with his weight, and in an instant he was swung safely across the little brook. He let go the plant, and came hobbling along to me with a look of triumph on his face that plainly indicated he was fully conscious of having performed a very clever feat.