Mandrill

“ Old males are remarkable for the ferocity of their disposition, as well as for other disagreeable qualities; but when young they can easily be tamed. Like baboons, mandrills appear to be indiscriminate eaters, feeding on fruit, roots, reptiles, insects, scorpions, &c., and inhabit open rocky ground rather than forests. Not much is known of the mandrill’s habits in the wild state, nor of the exact limits of its geographical distribution ”

“ Jerry was a powerful beast, especially in his fore-legs or arms. When he died, Mr Cross presented his skin to the British Museum, where it has been long preserved. The mandrill is a native of West Africa, where he is much dreaded by the negroes. [Pg 33]
In Cross's menagerie at Walworth, nearly twenty years ago, there was generally a fine mandrill. We remember the sulky ferocity of that restless eye. How angry the mild menagerist used to be at the ladies in the monkey-room with their parasols! ”

“ The most vividly coloured species of all is the Mandrill, which, in this matter exceeds all other living Mammals. The face, in the male, is produced forward to give the head a dog-like shape, while the whole of the upper surface of the muzzle has been transformed into a swollen, deeply fluted mass by the excessive inflation of the underlying bone. The bare skin covering this is of a brilliant cobalt blue, with lines of violet in the furrows, while the nose is of a bright scarlet. The naked skin of the buttocks, and the genital organs, are suffused with brilliant tints of scarlet and blue. ”

“ The high puffed-up cheeks are blue with red lines, the nose a fiery red, the hair of the head greyish green, and the whiskers lemon yellow. It is as malicious and violent as it is rapacious, and is found on the west coast of Africa. It is much feared on account of its strength. As it feeds chiefly on plants, it frequently does a great deal of damage; troops of these animals are said to have invaded the inhabited districts on the coast.
The mandrill does not fear man, and is never to be frightened by a gun-shot; the smallest trifle suffices to put it in a most violent rage. ”

“ In the mandrill, which is the most brilliantly coloured of all mammals, the ridges are vermilion and cobalt, while the callosities on the buttocks are of equal brilliance; but in the drill, which has white ear-tufts, the colouring is more sombre (see Baboon and Mandrill) . ”

“ Luke Manders agreed with him gravely. Gravely was the word for Luke Manders. He talked gravely, and walked gravely, and worked gravely, and it was to be seen that he thought gravely. There was no jest and youthful jollity in the young man from the mountains. He was as silent as one of the tall trees he had left behind him, and as strong, yet with always the sense of leashed action—action and power. Mr. ’Gene Carey and old Ben Birdsall felt it and leaned on it, and Miss Ada Tenafee felt it and feared it, and Glen Darrow felt it and rejoiced and exulted. ”

“ MANDRAKE, or Atropa mandragora, L. an exotic plant, growing in Spain, Portugal, Italy, and the Levant: it is propagated by seeds, and treated in a similar manner with the more tender exotic plants.—According to Bechstein, the carrot-like root of the Mandrake, in its native climate, penetrates from three to four feet deep into the soil, where it remains sound for fifty years.—The plant is divided into male and female, the vegetation and growth of which are alike in both; though the leaves, roots, and seeds of the latter are longer, narrower, and of a darker colour than those of the male. ”

“ Manderson was like that, and he was not the only one. I suppose you might compare the state of mind to that of a soldier who is personally a truthful man, but who will stick at nothing to deceive the enemy. The rules of the game allow it; and the same may be said of business as many business men regard it. Only with them it is always war-time."
"It is a sad world," observed Mr. Cupples.
"As you say," Marlowe agreed. "Now I was saying that one could always take Manderson's word if he gave it in a definite form. ”

“ He was delighted to find every man's hand against him.
"RUSKIN," said Slip, "decrees that not only should one give to beggars, but that one should give kindly and deliberately and not as though the coin were red-hot."
The Mandril threw himself wildly into the argument. He told us dreadful stories of beggars and their ways—of advertisements he had seen in which the advertisers undertook to supply beggars with emaciated children at so much per day. Children with visible sores were in great demand, he said; nothing like a child to charm money from the pockets of passers-by, etc., etc. ”

“ Manderson would come in by the front, hang up his hat and coat in the hall, and pass down the hall into the study. It seems likely to me that he was in a great hurry to use the telephone, and so went straight across the lawn to the window. He was like that, sir, when there was anything important to be done. He had his hat on, now I remember, and had thrown his greatcoat over the end of the table. He gave his order very sharp, too, as he always did when busy. A very precipitate man indeed was Mr. Manderson; a hustler, as they say. ”

“ You may say what you like, but the idea of impersonating Manderson in those circumstances was an extraordinarily ingenious idea."
"Ingenious—certainly!" replied Mr. Cupples. "Extraordinarily so—no! In those circumstances (your own words) it was really not strange that it should occur to a clever man. It lay almost on the surface of the situation. Marlowe was famous for his imitation of Manderson's voice; he had a talent for acting; he knew the ways of the establishment intimately. ”

“ At every turn the cunning of Manderson had forestalled me. His careful concealment of such a hatred was a characteristic feature of the stratagem; only a man of his iron self-restraint could have done it. You can see for yourselves how every fact in my statement would appear, in the shadow of Manderson's death, a clumsy lie. I tried to imagine myself telling such a story to the counsel for my defense. ”

“ No other person, apart from the servants, had his opportunities for knowing the domestic life of the Mandersons in detail.
(5) I ascertained beyond doubt that Marlowe arrived at a hotel in Southampton on the Monday morning at six-thirty, and there proceeded to carry out the commission which, according to his story, and to the statement made to Mrs. Manderson in the bedroom by the false Manderson, had been entrusted to him by his employer. He had then returned in the car to Marlstone, where he had shown great amazement and horror at the news of the murder. ”

“ As he leaned into the coach, the rain pattered on his back, hissed into the torches of the linkmen, striped in long slants and snake-lines the farther windows of the coach. From gutter and cobble-stone, roof and pavement, rang out the song of the rain. Ever and anon would come a flying gust, and all the lights of torch and lantern would bend, burn blue, and madly dance. Lord Mandeville's horses stamped and shivered and shook the harness. But his Lordship himself had no thought but to marvel on the snowdrop beauty of the face of Rachel Peace when the lights and shadows played on it. ”

“ My men shall make for me a litter of poles, with robes and garments slung between, and bear me to Mannerley. There will I bide till my wound is healed. Say to thy father, the Lord of Mountjoy, that I renounce all the vengeance that my father and my brother swore against him, and that I extend to him also the hand of friendship. ’Twill please me well if, while I still lie at Mannerley, he and thou and Cedric come riding there and visit me. And so good-by with all my heart. May thou win safely home and Heaven’s blessing follow thee. ”

“ She had merely spoken with him as she lay half asleep, resuming a conversation which she had had with her living husband about an hour before. Martin, I perceived, could only have seen the man's back, as he sat crouching over the telephone; no doubt a characteristic pose was imitated there. And the man had worn his hat, Manderson's broad-brimmed hat! There is too much character in the back of a head and neck. The unknown, in fact, supposing him to have been of about Manderson's build, had had no need for any disguise, apart from the jacket and the hat and his powers of mimicry. ”

“ It seems unnecessary, therefore, to strain the word mandorle to mean something else than its more obvious meaning: and it is surely much more probable, that the document and quotation, both refer to designs for the remaining four mandorle, which are generally supposed to have been filled in by Carlo Amidei, and Matteo Pini in 1780.136 However this may be, the smallness of the sum paid for the designs, 75 soldi, makes the idea, that it was a payment for drawings of any size, even more improbable and absurd. ”

“ Manderson having something to do with the crime. Rather than that I should lose myself in barren speculations about this, you decided to tell me exactly how matters stood, and incidentally to impress upon me, who know how excellent your judgment is, your opinion of your niece. Is that about right?"
"It is perfectly right. Listen to me, my dear fellow," said Mr. Cupples earnestly, laying his hand on the other's arm. "I am going to be very frank. I am extremely glad that Manderson is dead. I believe him to have done nothing but harm in the world as an economic factor. ”

“ They went up the bank, and going about fifty yards, came out on an open space in which was a large camp and some native-looking gunyahs, or leaf and branch huts.
And then Mandeville could see his hosts, or his captors, whichever they might turn out to be, and his heart sank within him, for they were nearly all big, and one was gigantic, and their whole appearance was that of the dead man whom they had seen. It was like a nightmare truly to see them clad in skins, rough and hairy, and burnt as black as white men can ever get. ”

“ He found William de Mandeville praying at a wayside shrine, and cursed him for it. "Why should I honour Christ?" he cried. "Why should I think Him worthy of honour, who takes from me all honour and leaves me naked in my age to my enemies?" He flung himself into Le Mans, the prize of Anjou, his own town, to hold that if he could, and Philip and Richard came and encamped round about. The next day they broke through his men who held the bridge, they set fire to the town. With a handful of horsemen the old King fled.
"His hour has struck, brother," said William de Mandeville to William le Marshal. ”

“ The curtains were never drawn in the hot weather. Mr. Manderson would often sit right in the doorway at nights, smoking and looking out into the darkness. But nobody could have seen him who had any business to be there."
"I see. And now tell me this. Your hearing is very acute, you say, and you heard Mr. Manderson enter the house when he came in after dinner from the garden. Did you hear him re-enter it after returning from the motor-drive?"
Martin paused. ”

“ Stephen, who was immersed in a book on Mayflies, put in ten francs under the impression that he was subscribing towards the rent of the Mess. The Mandril appeared to have quite forgotten his dislike of beggars.
Tailer took the plate out and returned with it empty. "He's gone, Sir," he said.
"I'm glad for your sake, dear Mandril, that you have fallen in with our views," said Slip.
"What!" shouted the Mandril. "I quite forgot. A beggar!—the wretched impostor." He rushed to the window. An old man had rounded the corner of the house and was crossing the road on his way to a small café opposite. ”

“ I had not to cast about very long for the motive a man might have in forcing his feet into Manderson's narrow shoes. The examination of footmarks is very well understood by the police. But not only was the man concerned to leave no footmarks of his own. He was concerned to leave Manderson's, if any; his whole plan, if my guess was right, must have been directed to producing the belief that Manderson was in the place that night. Moreover, his plan did not turn upon leaving footmarks. He meant to leave the shoes themselves, and he did so. ”

“ It’s out of date, now, even in the mountains. The Manders family is the last to carry on, I understand. He’s got a head on him, that boy; he’ll learn—learn fast!”
She had never seen him so alertly interested. It became an obsession with him in the weeks which followed; they took toilsome trips far out of their way to find Luke Manders, and they made little progress [30] in confidence or friendship, but this merely added a fillip to their determination. It became a sort of golden legend with them, gilding their dull days. “Well, Glen, I saw him!”
“Oh, did you, Dad?” ”

“ Her answer in that same Quaker phraseology with which she had been thus insolently baited, her delicate, serious air, held strange rebuke for one who could feel it. Mr. Stafford lifted the single eyeglass that hung from a ribbon round his neck, to look at her with ever-deepening interest. Lord Mandeville came a pace nearer. The young gentleman from Norwich thought the little silence that had fallen on the room could betoken nothing but a flattering attention centred on his next move. ”

“ Manderson had put out the decanter of whisky and a syphon and glass, sir, from the cupboard where he kept them—"
Trent held up his hand. "While we are on that point, Martin, I want to ask you plainly, did Mr. Manderson drink very much? You understand this is not impertinent curiosity on my part. I want you to tell me because it may possibly help in the clearing up of this case."
"Perfectly, sir," replied Martin gravely. "I have no hesitation in telling you what I have already told the inspector. Mr. Manderson was, considering his position in life, a remarkably abstemious man. ”