It inhabits the northern and eastern provinces, and the wooded hills which occur in those portions of the island. In appearance it differs both in size and in colour from the common Wanderoo (_S. Nestor_), being larger and greyer, and its habits are much less reserved. Where the population is comparatively numerous, these Monkeys become so familiarised with the presence of man as to exhibit the utmost daring and indifference. A flock of them will take possession of a Palmyra palm, and so effectually can they crowd and conceal themselves among the leaves that, on the slightest danger, the whole party becomes invisible on the instant. The presence of a Dog, however, excites such an irrepressible curiosity, that, in order to watch his movements, they never fail to betray themselves. They may be seen frequently congregated on the roof of a native hut; and some years ago the child of a European clergyman having been left on the ground by the nurse, was so teased and bitten by them as to cause its death. The Ceylon people hold the singular belief that the remains of a Monkey are never found in the forest--a belief which they have embodied in a proverb, that “He who has seen a white crow, the nest of the piddybird, a straight cocoa-nut tree, or a dead Monkey, is certain to live for ever.” “This piece of folk-lore has evidently reached Ceylon from India,” writes Sir J. Emerson Tennent, from whose work the extract is taken, “where it is believed that persons dwelling on the spot where a Hoonuman Monkey (_Semnopithecus entellus_) has been killed, will die, and that even its bones are unlucky, and that no house erected where they are hid will prosper. Hence, when a house is to be built, one of the employments of wise men is to ascertain by their science that none such are concealed; and Buchanan observes that it is perhaps owing to the fear of this ill-luck that no native will acknowledge having seen a dead Hoonuman.”