Chap. III. APPENDIX. 



37^ 



cart nearly emptied agairr ; and learned a lefTon by it, which he ne- 

 ver afterwards neglected. 



** Thefe were all the circumflances which I was able to colled ; 

 and I ftiall be happy if they afford you any fatisfaQion." 



From this account of him, It is evident that he is not an idiot, as 

 fome people are willing to believe him to be, but fuch a man as 

 one fhould exped a mere favage to be, that is, a man that has not 

 the ufe of fpeech, and is entirely uninftruded in all our arts and 

 fciences. What alone can induce any one to believe him an ideot, 

 is that he has not learned in fo long a time to fpeak, though he was 

 fent to fchool, and, as it is laid, much pains taken upon him. But, 

 in xhtjirji place, it is to be confidered that he was about fifteen, as 

 the Newfpapers fay, when he was catched and brought to England, 

 and much older, if we believe the account of his age given by the 

 farmer, with whom he lives. Now, though articulation be learned 

 by infants, whofe organs are tender, foft, and pliable, by imitation 

 only, or at leaft without much trouble in teaching them, yet, when 

 they grow up, and their organs become hard, and lefs flexible, they 

 cannot learn by imitation merely, nor by teaching without much diffi- 

 culty, if at all, as is evident from the cafe of thofe who have been 

 brought up in civilized nations, and accuftomed to fpeak from their 

 infancy, and yet cannot pronounce certain articulate founds, be- 

 caufe they have not learned to do it when they were infants. Thus, 

 a Frenchman, as I obferved before, cannot pronounce the Greek 

 0, or the Engllfh ih, nor an Englifhman the afpirated kappa^ 

 of the Greeks, that is the x. 



ido^ The fchooling, that Peter got, was not fuch as, I think, could 

 have taught him to fpeak when he was fo far advanced in life, if 

 lie had had the heft natural parts, and a greater difpofition to learn,, 



than 



