GRIEF IN A CHIMPANZEE.

Thames Star, Volume X, Issue 3295, 14 July 1879, Page 2

GRIEF IN A CHIMPANZEE.

From a study of a fine pair of chimpanzees in the Philadelphia Zoologicalgarden, Mr A. E. Brown has obtained several interesting evidences of a rather high degree of mental power in this species. One of the pair lately died, and the behaviour of the surviving one seemed to bear somewhat on the acquired nature of the physical means by which our own strongly excited emotions find 4 relief, as well as on the origin of those' emotions themselves. Evidence of a certain degree of genuine grief were well marked. The animals had been great friends; they never quarrelled. On the first cry of fright from one, the other was instantly prepared to do battle in iis behalf. It was early in a morning when the .female died, and when the survivor found it im'--possible to arouse her his grief and rage were painful to witness... Snatching at the short hair on his head, the ordinary

yell of rage at first set up finally changed .to a cry, the like of which he had never been heard to utter before, and | which would be most nearly represented by hah-ah-ah ah-ah, uttered somewhat .under the breath and with a plaintive sound like a moan. Crying thus, he Jwould lift up her head and then her 'hands, only to let them fall again. After her body was removed he became more quiet; but, catching sight ~ofit on its being carried pait the cage, he became violent, and cried for the rest of that day. The day following he sat still most of the time, and moaned continuously; this gradually passed away, the plaintive cry became less frequent; but when he was angry it would be heard at the close of the fits just as the sobbing of a child after a passionate fit of crying. It soon ' became apparent that his recollection of the nature of the past association was becoming less and less vivid, still it was noticed that, while the two used to sleep together in one blanket on the floor, hV now invariably slept on a cross beam at the top of the cage.jM»±"r-^~ ~~i P T?*»i)mL habit, »nii--rT-'". ' ''^^^^^^^

heightened by his sense of loneliness. A high degree of permanence in grief of this nature of all probability belongs only to man.—Times.