45^ Eimer on Growlh and Inheritance 



. . . When he desired a thing, he cried ''oh," or "o-oh," in the 

 latter case the second syllable being higher than the first. At the 

 same time he laid his ears close to his head, drew back his brows, and 

 pouted his lips. Joy and pleasure he expressed by a grunting or 

 gurgling throat-sound. At the same time he laid back his ears for a 

 short time, drew back all the skin of his head for a moment with a 

 jerk, his eyebrows being thus also drawn back, and stretched out Lis 

 mouth with the lips narrowed. In extreme pleasurable excitement 

 he disclosed his teeth as far back as the middle of the molar series, 

 and uttered a slight tittering sound like " ki ki ki," and so on. 



As to all this we will only remark that it is improper and 

 misleading to describe inarticulate sounds by articulate ex- 

 pression, such as ' ki ki ki.' 



The truth concerning the real nature of brute language is 

 well expressed by Schleicher, although he takes what we re- 

 gard as a mistaken view of the origin of human speech. He 

 says : — 



* Sound-gestures, in some cases highly developed sound-gestures, 

 for the direct expression of its feelings and desires, the animal 

 possesses, and by means of these, or by means of other gestures, 

 animals are able to communicate their feelings to one another. Ac- 

 cordingly, it is usual to talk of the speech of animals. But the 

 faculty of directly expressing thought by means of sound is possessed 

 by no animal, and this alone is the meaning of speech. How fully 

 this is in fact recognised in our ordinary consciousness is shown by 

 the consideration that an ape endowed with speech, or even an animal 

 utterly different from man externally, if it possesses the power of 

 speech would be regarded by us as a man.' ^ 



If it truly possessed the power of speech — that is, if it had 

 the power of expressing abstract ideas, though only by ges- 

 ture — it would properly be so regarded, for it w^ould plainly 

 be ' a rational animal.' But it might make use of articulate 

 sounds like a parrot, or it might have learned to use arti- 

 culate sounds as a dog begs, and not otherwise. In that case 



1 P. 370. 



