I have little to add to the remarks given in the first volume of this
"Hand-book." I may refer, however, to the interest which attaches to the
study of the extinct forms of life, in relation to those which exist at the
present day. Although I have endeavoured, to the best of my ability, to
present to the student as complete a review of the species of Monkeys known
to us at the present time, I am well aware that there is an enormous amount
of work to be done before our knowledge of the Primates can be said to be
complete. There is a natural repugnance to collecting specimens of Monkeys
on the part of sportsmen. To shoot one feels like killing a sort of
relation, and even our best collectors, who thoroughly understood the
necessity of obtaining specimens in the interests of science, speak with a
feeling of pain of the human-like distress which a wounded Monkey exhibits;
and it is, therefore, difficult to induce travellers to shoot animals which
offer so much of a "counterfeit presentment" to human beings.
The loose way in which the older naturalists expressed themselves in regard
to geographical distribution, has also rendered a correct appreciation of
the ranges of some of the Primates exceedingly difficult. Thus "Brazil"
may mean any portion of the South American continent from the Argentine
Republic to the Amazons, and "Mexique" has done duty in many Museums for
any locality between Mexico and Panama. Much, therefore, remains to be done
to define the exact areas which the different species of Primates inhabit.