Chapter HOOGLY RIVER to HOOLUCK of H by The Hobson Jobson Dictionary

under HOOKA.)

1801.—“The Resident … tells a strange story how his hookah-burdar, after cheating and robbing him, proceeded to England, and set up as the Prince of Sylhet, took in everybody, was waited upon by Pitt, dined with the Duke of York, and was presented to the King.”—Elphinstone, in Life, i. 34.

HOOKUM, s. An order; Ar.—H. hukm. (See under HAKIM.)

[1678.—“The King’s hookim is of as small value as an ordinary Governour’s.”— In Yule, Hedges’ Diary, Hak. Soc. ii. xlvi.

[1880.—“Of course Raja Joe Hookham will preside.”—Ali Baba, 106.]

HOOLUCK, s. Beng. hulak? The word is not in the Dicts., [but it is possibly connected with uluk, Skt. uluka, ‘an owl,’ both bird and animal taking their name from their wailing note]. The black gibbon (Hylobates hoolook, Jerd.; [Blanford, Mammalia, 5]), not unfrequently tamed on our E. frontier, and from its gentle engaging ways, and plaintive cries, often becoming a great pet. In the forests of the Kasia Hills, when there was neither sound nor sign of a living creature, by calling out hoo! hoo! one sometimes could wake a clamour in response from the hoolucks, as if hundreds had suddenly started to life, each shouting hoo! hoo! hoo! at the top of his voice.

c. 1809.—“The Hulluks live in considerable herds; and although exceedingly noisy, it is difficult to procure a view, their activity in springing from tree to tree being very great; and they are very shy.”—Buchanan’s Rungpoor, in Eastern India, iii. 563.

1868.—“Our only captive this time was a huluq monkey, a shy little beast, and very rarely seen or caught. They have black fur with white breasts, and go about usually in pairs, swinging from branch to branch with incredible agility, and making the forest resound with their strange cachinatory cry. …”—T. Lewin, A Fly on the Wheel, 374.

1884.—“He then … describes a gibbon he had (not an historian nor a book, but a specimen of Hylobates hooluck) who must have been wholly delightful. This engaging anthropoid used to put his arm through Mr. Sterndale’s, was extremely clean in his habits (‘which,’ says Mr. Sterndale thoughtfully and truthfully, ‘cannot be said of all the monkey tribe’), and would not go to sleep without a pillow. Of course he died of consumption. The gibbon, however, as a pet has one weakness, that of ‘howling in a piercing and somewhat hysterical fashion for some minutes till exhausted.’”—Saty. Review, May 31, on Sterndale’s Nat. Hist. of Mammalia of India, &c.