Chap. XIX.] MUSICAL POWERS. 321 



appear from their vagueness, yet depth, like mental re- 

 versions to the emotions and thoughts of a long-past age. 

 All these facts with respect to music become to a cer- 

 tain extent intelligible if we may assume that musical 

 tones and rhythm were used by the half-human progeni- 

 tors of man, during the season of courtship, when animals 

 of all kinds are excited by the strongest passions. In 

 this case, from the deeply-laid principle of inherited asso- 

 ciations, musical tones would be likely to excite in us, in 

 a vague and indefinite manner, the strong emotions of a 

 long-past age. Bearing in mind that the males of some 

 quadrumanous animals have their vocal organs much 

 more developed than in the females, and that one anthro- 

 pomorphous species pours forth a whole octave of musical 

 notes and may be said to sing, the suspicion does not ap- 

 pear improbable that the progenitors of man, either'the 

 males or females, or both sexes, before they had acquired 

 the power of expressing their mutual love in articulate 

 language, endeavored to charm each other with musical 

 notes and rhythm. So little is known about the use of 

 the voice by the Quadrumana during the season of love, 

 that we have hardly any means of judging whether the 

 habit of singing was first acquired by the male or female 

 progenitors of mankind. Women are generally thought 

 to possess sweeter voices than men, and as far as this 

 serves as any guide we may infer that they first acquired 

 musical powers in order to attract the other sex. 36 But 

 if so, this must have occurred long ago, before the pro- 

 genitors of man had become sufficiently human to treat 

 and value their women merely as useful slaves. The im- 

 passioned orator, bard, or musician, when with his varied 

 tones and cadences he excites the strongest emotions in 

 his hearers, little suspects that he uses the same means by 



35 See an interesting discussion on this subject by Hiickel, ' Generelie 

 Morph.' B. it 1866, s. 246. 



