Democratic Sentinel, Volume 16, Number 35, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 September 1892 — Suicude of a Monkey. [ARTICLE]

Suicude of a Monkey.

Whether animals ever really kill themselves intentionally has often teen questioned; but well-authenti-cated cases of dogs and cats compassing iheir own death have been known,, and here is a strictly true story of a monkey who apparently did the same. It was a spider monkey, a pet, who was ill, and plainly could not live. To save her suffering her loving mistress decided to have her shot, and she was intrusted to a kind-hearted man, who agreed to put a merciful end to her troubles. He took her to his place out of town, and while he made his preparations left her alone in a large, unfurnished room. The room had been used for some of an entertainment, and had, hanging from a beam, a rope with a noose at the end, used to hold a lantern. There was no way of getting up to the beam except by climbing the upright side beams and the monkey was weak from her illness; yet when the man came back in about a half hour, he found her hanging and dead. No one had been in. She had climbed to the beam, drawn up the rope, and put her head through the noose, or else climbed down the rope for the purpose. There is scarcely a doubt that it was a deliberate suicide. The man who found her, and who had had great experience with the spider monkey, declared that she understood her condition, and preferred to end her career.