5/0 The Descent of Man. Part 111. 



ase to man in reference tc his daily habits of life, they must be 

 ranked amongst the most mysterious with which he is endowed. 

 They are present, though in a very rude condition, in men of all 

 races, even the most savage ; but so different is the taste of the 

 several races, that our music gives no pleasure to savages, and 

 their music is to us in most cases hideous and unmeaning. Dr. 

 Seemann, in some interesting remarks on this subject, 35 " doubts 

 " whether even amongst the nations of Western Europe, in- 

 " timately connected as tbey are by close and frequent inter- 

 " course, the music of the one is interpreted in the same sense by 

 " the others. By travelling eastwards we find that there is cer- 

 " tainly a different language of music. Songs of joy and dance- 

 " accompaniments are no longer, as with us, in the major keys, 

 " but always in the minor." Whether or not the half-human 

 progenitors of man possessed, like the singing gibbons, the 

 capacity of producing, and therefore no doubt of appreciating, 

 musical notes, we know that man possessed these faculties at a 

 very remote period. M. Lartet has described two flutes, made 

 out of the bones and horns of the reindeer, found in caves 

 together with flint tools and the remains of extinct animals. 

 The arts of singing and of dancing are also very ancient, and 

 are now practised by all or nearly all the lowest races of man. 

 Poetry, which may be considered as the offspring of song, is like- 

 wise so ancient, that many persons have felt astonished that it 

 should have arisen during the earliest ages of winch we have 

 any record. 



We see that the musical faculties, which are not wholly deficient, 

 in any race, are cajDable of prompt and high development, for Hot- 

 tentots and Negroes have become excellent musicians, although in 

 their native countries they rarely practise anything that we should 

 consider music. Schweinfurth, however, was pleased with some 

 of the simple melodies which he heard in the interior of Africa. 

 But there is nothing anomalous in the musical faculties lying 

 dormant in man : some species of birds which never naturally 

 sing, can without much difficulty be taught to do so ; thus a 

 house-sparrow has learnt the song of a linnet. As these two 

 species are closely allied, and belong to the order of Insessores, 

 which includes nearly all the singing-birds in the world, it is 

 possible that a progenitor of the sparrow may have been a 

 songster. It is more remarkable that parrots, belonging to 

 a group distinct from the Insessores, and having differently 



35 'Journal of Anthropolog. Soc.' cond edition, 1869, which contain 



Oct. 1870, p. civ. See also the an admirable account of the habit? 



loveral later chapters in Sir John of savages. 

 Lubbock's ' Prehistoric Times, 5 se- 



