Ghap. n. ANTIENT METAPHYSICS. 33 



nus, is to be confidered as an Individual, and accordingly it is called, 

 by Ariftotle, t« V,to/«4. t- 't,h,. 



The laft ftep of this progrcflion I likewife faw, and it was a great 

 one. It was the wild girl, o^c JiUe fawvage^ as the French called 

 her, who came from a country where the people had learned 

 to articulate very imperfedly indeed, but fufficiently to communi- 

 cate their wants and defires. I faw her in Paris about 26 years ago, 

 and converfed with her much, as fhe had been then in Paris for fe- 

 veral years, and fpoke French well enough. She was taken up by 

 a French fhlp fomewhere upon the coaft of Labradore, and was 

 carried to one of the Weft India iflands, from whence fhe failed 

 in a fhip, which was wrecked upon the coaft of Flanders, and 

 only fhe and a negro girl were faved. Her firft appearance 

 in France was at a village called Songe, near to Chalon in Cham- 

 pagne, whither I went to inquire about her. She was firft {ttn 

 there fwimming a river, and coming out of it with a fifti in her 

 hand, which fhe had caught : For fhe told me, that in her 

 country they lived like beavers, always near water, and caught 

 the fifti with their hands, by diving, as the people of the 

 Ladrone Iflands do. They were hunters, too; and flie and the ne- 

 gro girl, in their journey from Flanders, fubfifted on game, which 

 they caught by ipeed of foot. She faid, that in her country, befides 

 language, they had a certain mufic, which they had formed in imitation 

 of birds. But they had no ufe of fire, and in that, too, they refembled 

 the people of the Ladrone Iflands; and fhe told me, that, when fhe firft 

 came to France, a fire in a room was her terror and abhorrence ; and 

 the eating of flefh, drefl"ed by fire, threw her into a very bad difeafe, 

 of which fhe recovered with much difficulty. She was wonderfully 

 fwift of foot, and could overtake, in that way, almoft any animal, 

 and then knock it on the head with a bludgeon fhe wore, which 

 Ihe called a boutoUy a name given, by the inhabitants of the Carrib- 



VoL. IV. E bee 



