LANGUAGE. 179 



strained. " All other animals," he says, " as well 

 as man, are possessed of the natural language of 

 the passions, expressed in signs or tones ; and we 

 shall endeavour to evince that those animals which 

 have preserved themselves from being enslaved by 

 mankind, and are associated in flocks, are also pos- 

 sessed of some artificial language and of some tra- 

 ditional knowledge. 



" The mother-turkey, when she eyes a kite hover- 

 ing high in air, has either seen her own parents 

 thrown into fear at his presence, or has by observa- 

 tion been acquainted with his dangerous designs 

 upon her young. She becomes agitated with fear, 

 and uses the natural language of that passion ; her 

 young ones catch the fear by imitation, and in an 

 instant conceal themselves in the grass. 



" At the same time that she shows her fears by 

 her gesture and deportment, she uses a certain ex- 

 clamation, Koe-ut, Koe-ut, and the young ones after- 

 ward know that the presence of their adversary is 

 denounced, and hideHhemselves as before. 



" The wild tribes of birds have very frequent op- 

 portunities of knowing their enemies by observing 

 the destruction they make among their progeny, of 

 which every year but a small part escapes to ma- 

 turity ; but to our domestic birds these opportuni- 

 ties so rarely occur, that their knowledge of their 

 distant enemies must frequently be delivered by tra- 

 dition in the manner above explained, through many 

 generations. 



" This note of danger, as well as the other notes 

 of the mother-turkey, when she calls her flock to 

 their food or to sleep under her wings, appears to 

 be an artificial language, both as expressed by the 

 mother and as understood by the progeny. For a 

 hen teaches this language with equal ease to the 

 ducklings she has hatched from supposititious eggs, 

 and educates as her own offspring ; and the wag- 

 tails or hedge-sparrows learn it from the young 



