And then they all cried out, making a great noise, “Yes, yes. Let us give him the finest present a White Man ever had!”
Now they began to wonder and ask one another what would be the best thing to give him. And one said, “Fifty bags of coconuts!” And another—“A hundred bunches of bananas!—At least he shall not have to buy his fruit in the Land Where You Pay to Eat!”
But Chee-Chee told them that all these things would be too heavy to carry so far and would go bad before half was eaten.
“If you want to please him,” he said, “give him an animal. You may be sure he will be kind to it. Give him some rare animal they have not got in the menageries.”
And the monkeys asked him, “What are menageries ?”
Then Chee-Chee explained to them that menageries were places in the Land of the White Men, where animals were put in cages for people to come and look at. And the monkeys were very shocked and said to one another,
“These Men are like thoughtless young ones—stupid and easily amused. Sh! It is a prison he means.”
So then they asked Chee-Chee what rare animal it could be that they should give the Doctor—one the White Men had not seen before. And the Major of the Marmosettes asked,
“Have they an iguana over there?”
But Chee-Chee said, “Yes, there is one in the London Zoo.”
And another asked, “Have they an okapi?”