This sub-family comprises the true baboons of Africa and the monkey-like baboons of India. They have the stomach simple, and cheek-pouches are always present. According to Cuvier they possess, like the last family, a fifth tubercle on their last molars. They produce early, but are not completely adult for four or five years; the period of gestation is seven months.
The third sub-family of Simiadæ consists of the genera Cercopithicus, Macacus, and Cynocephalus, as generally accepted by modern zoologists, but Jerdon seems to have followed Ogilby in his classification, which merges the long-tailed Macaques into Cercopithecus, and substituting Papio for the others.
Cuvier applies this term to the Magots or rudimentary-tailed Macaques. The monkeys of this genus are more compactly built than those of the last. They are also less herbivorous in their diet, eating frogs, lizards, crabs and insects, as well as vegetables and fruit. Their callosities and cheek-pouches are large, and they have a sac which communicates with the larynx under the thyroid cartilage, which fills with air when they cry out.
Some naturalists of the day, however, place all under the generic name Macacus.
[NO. 17. INUUS vel MACACUS SILENUS.]
The Lion Monkey (Jerdon's No. 6).
| Macacus silenus. |
NATIVE NAMES.—Nil bandar, Bengali; Shia bandar, Hindi; Nella manthi, Malabari.