364 APPENDIX. Chap. III. 



ftature, being about two and one-half French feet, and fhowed much 

 more fcnfe and docility than any infant of that age among us. And, 

 indeed, what he did was wonderful in fo young a child ; for he fat at 

 table, did what he faw the reftof tlie company do, unfolded his napkin, 

 wiped liis mouth with it, ufed the Tpoon and fork to carry his victuals 

 to his mouth, filled his glak, andjhockcd with it, as the French call it, 

 when he was invited fo to do : With all this he was perfedlly tame 

 and gentle, and even kind and complaifant ; for he gave his hand to 

 the company to conduct them down flairs, and came up to gentle- 

 men and ladies to be carelTed by them, as our children do, and 

 walked with them with gravity and compofure *. Now, if it be 



true 



* BuiTon, Vol. xlv. p. 53. See wliat I have written upon the fubje^t of the 



OranT Outang, Vol. i. of the Origin and Progrcfs of Language, Second Edition, 



Book ii. Chap. iv. and v. p. 343. The account which Buffon gives of this Orang 



Outang infant is fuch, that, if he had believed, as I do, that the Orang Outang 



belongs to our fpecies, one fliould have thought that he magnified very much to fup- 



port his hypothefis, fo much as to make him not only a man, fuch as we are, but of a 



race of men much fuperior to us. And, indeed, what he fays muft appear incredible 



to thofe who have fo narrow a notion of the human fpecies, as to believe that all men, 



in all ages and countries, have been, and are fuch as we fee them in Europe. But, 



if we <Tive any credit to travellers, who have been among barbarous nations, 



(and how elfe can we be informed of thofe nations), wc mufl believe that the 



children of favage men are very much ftronger bodied, and farther advanced in 



natural fagacity and underflanding than children of the fame age among us. Keopin, 



the Swedifh traveller, relates that he himfelf faw a child, the offspring of a woman 



by an Orang Outang, run about as foon as it was born, and climb up upon every 



thing that was near it, as I have related, p. 133. And M. de la Broffe, a traveller 



whom I have quoted in the Origin and Progrefs of Language, Vol. i. p. 277. of the 



Second Edition, relates of this very animal, the Orang Outang, that two young 



ones whom he purchafed, much younger than M. Bufl'on's Orang Outang, the one 



of them being no more than fourteen months old, and the pther only twelve, fat at 



table, and did fcveral of the things mentioned by BufFon, contrived to make them- 



felves underftood by the cabin-boys aboard his fliip ; and, when thefe boys did not 



^ive them wliat they wanted, feized them, bit them, and threw them down. • 



