When Kent woman Louise Smith played with a monkey in South Africa she had him eating out of the palm of her hand... almost.

For the Maidstone council public relations officer joined in a touching game with the capuchin monkey in Pretoria... and the simple video has gone viral.

Now the clip - which shows the primate repeatedly opening and closing her hand to reveal leaves in a child-like game - has been seen by more than a million viewers.

Miss Smith, 29, filmed Chino the brown capuchin primate while volunteering for two weeks at International Primate Rescue in Pretoria, South Africa, last year, and posted the footage of him on video sharing website YouTube five months ago.

In it, he holds her hand and gets her to crush some leaves, before looking at them crushed, and grabbing another handful to see her do it again.

She said: “He really likes doing it. I saw he was running around and so I went up to him. He is so cute - absolutely adorable.

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“I had showed the video to friends and family and they said “It’s so cute”, so I put it on there. I had no idea it had taken off so much.

"It gradually built up more and more views. It started getting more attention.”

“It is just amazing. It is really weird to think that over a million people have watched my video” - Louise Smith

Miss Smith’s posting has been seen by more than 400,000 people, but after another person copied the film it got a further 600,000 hits.

She added: “It is just amazing. It is really weird to think that over a million people have watched my video.”

She plans to add information to it showing where it was taken, so that people can donate to the charity, which relies entirely on donations.

Video: Louise Smith plays with her pal Chino

She has also been approached by companies who would like to sell it to TV companies to be included in viral compilation shows.