Chap. I. ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. 4^ 



And, firft, there is the fad, which I have related in the Firft Vo- 

 hime of the Origin and Progrefs of Language, upon information 

 which I had from the mouth of a perfon of undoubted veracity, 

 concerning fome men that were fold as Negroe ilaves in Africa, a- 

 bout the mouth of the river Gaboon, who had not attained the fa^ 

 culty of fpeech. 



There is another fad: concerning wild men without the ufe of 

 fpeech, which comes to me from the Reverend Mr Maddifon, Pro- 

 feffor of Mathematics in the Univerfity of Williamfburgh in Virgi- 

 nia, who was in London about fix years ago, and, for any thing I 

 know, may be , there flill ; and he avers it as a fadl well known in 

 Virginia. He fays that, a few years before I got this information 

 from him, there were found in the lower parts of Virginia, in a 

 place called the Difmal Swamp, two young men, the one of the age 

 of twenty, and the other of feventeen or eighteen, as nearly as could 

 be judged. They, at firft, fled from the fight of men, and were al- 

 together wild : But they were catched, and had been houfed, and 

 were become domeftic, at the time he left Virginia. They had be- 

 gun alfo to learn the Englilh language, and had acquired fome arti^ 

 culation, inftead of a found like the gaggling of geefe, by which 

 with the help of figns, they communicated with one another when 

 they firft were catched. Mr Maddifon could give no account by 

 what means they came to inhabit this fwamp, except a common re- 

 port, that their parents had fled to this place from the perfecution 

 of their creditors, and there had periflied, leaving their children very 

 young, who made a ftiift to live upon wild roots and filh. They 

 had large bellies and heads, and could run and climb extraordinarily 

 well. 



From this narrative we may learn what probably was the begin- 

 ning of language in all nations. Thofe two Savages communicated 



together 



