Next in the just finished Gerald Durrell's stories is the one titled " Encounters with animals". Wondering why this title as all his books which number in over two dozens or more, are supposedly on encounters with animals. Well, the stories continue in this collection of stories and unlike the " Bafut Beagles" that had one long story of encounters in Bafut in Cameroon, this one is a collection of stories and encounters at various places mostly in South America.
Durrell has a style that is gripping and doesn't let you put down the book. But since this one as a collection of various encounters that are unconnected, one could afford to breathe in between these stories.
In one story he talks about a creature Marmosets, about which I heard for the first time but after reading ( and looking at images) you feel like keeping a marmoset as a pet like Durrell did.
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"At first sight Pavlo ( his pet marmoset's name) resembled a curious kind of squirrel, until you noticed his very human face and his bright, shrewd brown eyes. His fur was soft, and presented a brindled appearance because the individual hairs were banded with orange, black and grey, in that order,his tail, however, was ringed with black and white. The fur on his head and neck was chocolate brown, and hung round his shoulders and chest in tattered fringe. His large warswere hidden by long ear-tufts of the same chocolate colour. Across his forehead, above his eyes and the aristocratic bridge of his tiny nose, was a broad white patch."
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