Mappo, the Merry Monkey | Page 2

said Mrs. Monkey. "Tigers are not often nice. After this you children had better stay in the tree--until you are a little larger, at least."
"But it's more fun on the ground," said Mappo.
"That may be," said Mrs. Monkey, as she looked down through the branches to see if the tiger were still waiting to catch one of her little ones. "But, Mappo, you and your brothers and sisters can run much better and faster in a tree than on the ground," said Mrs. Monkey.
And this is so. A monkey can get over the ground pretty fast on his four legs, as you can easily tell if you have ever watched a hand-organ monkey. But they can travel much faster up in the trees. For there is a hand on the end of each monkey's four limbs, and his curly tail is as good as another hand for grasping branches. So you see a monkey really has five hands with which to help himself along in the trees, and that is why he can swing himself along so swiftly, from one branch to another.
That is why it is safer for monkeys to be up in a tree than on the ground. There are very few other animals that can catch monkeys, once the five-handed creatures are up among the leaves. And monkeys can travel a long way through the forest without ever coming down to the ground. They swing themselves along from one tree to another, for miles and miles through the forest.
"Is it safe to go down now, Mamma?" asked Mappo of his mother, in monkey talk. This was a little while after the scare.
"No, not yet," she said. "That tiger may still be down there, waiting and hiding. You and Jacko and Bumpo, and Choo and Chaa stay up here, and pretty soon I will give you a new lesson."
"Oh, a new lesson!" exclaimed Jacko. "I wonder what kind it will be. We have learned to swing by our tails, and to hang by one paw. Is there anything else we can learn?"
"Many things," said the mamma monkey, for she and her husband had been teaching the children the different things monkeys must know to get along in the woods.
So the four little monkeys sat in the tree in front of their home, and waited for their mother to teach them a new lesson.
If you had seen Mappo's house, you would not have thought it a very nice one. It was just some branches of a tree, twined together, over a sort of platform, or floor, of dried branches. About all the house was used for was to keep off some of the rain that fell very heavily in the country where Mappo lived.
But this house suited the monkeys very well. They did not need to have a warm one, for it was never winter in the land where they lived. It was always hot and warm--sometimes too warm. There was never any snow or ice, but, instead, just rain. It rained half the year, and the other half it was dry. So, you see, Mappo's house was only needed to keep off the rain.
Mappo and the other monkeys did not stay in their houses very much. They went in them to sleep, but that was about all. The rest of the time they jumped about in the trees, looking for things to eat, and, once in a while, when there was no danger, they went down on the ground to play.
"I guess that tiger is gone now," said Jacko to Mappo. "Let's go down on the ground again, and get some of those green things that are good to eat."
The little monkeys had been eating some fruit, like green pears, which they liked very much, when the tiger came along and frightened them. Tigers would rather eat monkeys than green pears, I guess.
"Yes, I think we can go down now," said Mappo, looking through the leaves, and seeing nothing of the savage, striped tiger.
"You'd better ask mamma," said Choo, one of the little girl monkeys.
"Indeed I will not! I can see as good as she can that the tiger isn't there!" exclaimed Mappo.
You see monkey children don't want to mind, and be careful, any more than some human children do.
Mappo started to climb down the tree, holding on to the branches by his four paws and by his tail. He was almost to the ground, and Jacko and Bumpo were following him, when, all at once, there was a dreadful roar, and out sprang the tiger again.
"Oh, run! Run quick! Jump back!" screamed Mappo, and he and his brothers got back to their tree-house not a second too soon. The tiger snapped his teeth, and growled, he was so mad at being fooled the second time.
"Here! What did