284 DARWINISM STATED BY DARWIN HIMSELF. 



up his hands with the palms joined, he represents a cap- 

 tive who proves the completeness of his submission by 

 offering up his hands to be bound by the victor. It is 

 the pictorial representation of the Latin dare manus, to 

 signify submission." Hence it is not probable that either 

 the uplifting of the eyes or the joining of the open hands, 

 under the influence of devotional feelings, is an innate or 

 a truly expressive action ; and this could hardly have been 

 expected, for it is very doubtful whether feelings such as 

 we should now rank as devotional affected the hearts of 

 men while they remained during past ages in an uncivil- 

 ized condition. 



FROWNING. 



Expression "We may now inquire how it is that a frown 



tions 6 m " should express the perception of something 

 page 225. difficult or disagreeable, either in thought or 

 action. In the same way as naturalists find it advisable 

 to trace the embryological development of an organ in 

 order fully to understand its structure, so with the move- 

 ments of expression it is advisable to follow as nearly as 

 possible the same plan. The earliest and almost sole ex- 

 pression seen during the first days of infancy, and then 

 often exhibited, is that displayed during the act of 

 screaming ; and screaming is excited, both at first and 

 for some time afterward, by every distressing or displeas- 

 ing sensation and emotion — by hunger, pain, anger, jeal- 

 ousy, fear, etc. At such times the muscles round the 

 eyes are strongly contracted ; and this, as I believe, ex- 

 plains to a large extent the act of frowning during the 

 remainder of our lives. I repeatedly observed my own 

 infants, from under the age of one week to that of two 

 or three months, and found that, when a screaming-fit 

 came on gradually, the first sign was the contraction of 



