September 13, 1994

COTTON-TOP tamarins are the punks among monkeys: small in stature, big in hair and noisy. At six inches high and weighing barely a pound, they are one of the world's tiniest primates. A shock of white fur rises from the midline of the skull in a kind of Einsteinian Mohawk, dipping down toward ears so prominent they beg to be adorned by a row of hoop earrings. And the monkeys make gorgeous punk music, squealing, whistling, chirping, letting loose with slicing screams. But lest their singing be dismissed as so much senseless muddle, researchers say the tamarins' vocal repertory of 38 distinct sounds is unusually sophisticated, even by primate standards. It is structured like a language, conforming to grammatical rules and able to express curiosity, fear, dismay, playfulness, warnings of predators approaching, a desire to be groomed, joy over food discovered and calls to the young among them to join the feast.

Four Democratic candidates for attorney genera, above, face off today in the most unpredictable New York primary. Voters will pick Democratic and Republican candidates for Governor in New York and Connecticut, and Congressional races are also on the ballot. Article, page B1; summary of major races, page B4.

Even as Gov. Mario M. Cuomo and Senator George E. Pataki approached today's primaries as inconvenient speed bumps on the road to the general election, four Democratic candidates for attorney general and dozens of Congressional contenders campaigned furiously yesterday on a shimmering day for retail politics. In recent days, the advertising war between Mr. Cuomo and Mr. Pataki, both of whom face primaries today, has escalated from a skirmish into a firefight. Mr. Cuomo, for the first time in a television commercial, linked Mr. Pataki, a Republican from Putnam County, to Senator Alfonse M. D'Amato. Mr. Pataki, meanwhile, is broadcasting a mudslinging ad that criticizes Mr. Cuomo for mudslinging.

TOURIST ON SIGHTSEEING CRUISE IS SHOT A sightseeing boat cruising along the Harlem River between Manhattan and the Bronx came under gunfire and a German tourist was shot through the shoulder on the open upper deck. Alarmed passengers heard two or three more shots after the boat reached the Bronx shore seeking help. The tourist was knocked to the deck of the Circle Line boat just after it passed under the Washington Bridge at 181st Street. A1. NEW YORK CITY FOOD STAMP FRAUD RING IS SMASHED They were called markets, though they served few customers. And some of them actually stocked food, though it was often stale. But the main business of the operations was food stamps, according to Federal authorities in Manhattan, who said that they had smashed a ring of 30 Chinese grocers who trafficked illegally in the relief coupons and laundered more than $40 million in fraudulent receipts. B3.

SINCE the first stone tools appeared in Africa about two and a half million years ago, corresponding with the emergence of the earliest direct human ancestors, anthropologists have long assumed that the ability to make tools was somehow linked to brain size. The earliest members of the genus Homo, with a relatively large brains, had the ability, so it was thought, but not their smaller-brained primate relatives. This standard assumption is now being challenged by an anatomical study that has produced a rule of thumb that is more than a figure of speech.