f64 ANTI EN T METAPHYSICS. Book III. 



confonants, the firfl: language fpoken by men mud have been veiy 

 vocal. But even the five vowels, which we ufe, require certain 

 pofitions of the organs of the mouth, without which they cannot be 

 properly pronounced. But we have a vocal found from our throat, 

 which requires no particular pofition of the organs of the mouth, 

 nor any thing more than an open mouth. Now, the Wild Girl, 

 whom I faw in France, and of whom 1 have fpoken in feveral dif- 

 ferent paffages of this work*, told me that the language of the coun- 

 try, from which fhe came, confifted wholely of fuch founds from 

 the throat, articulated by fome guttural confonants, fuch as the 

 Kuppa^ Gamma, and Cbi of the Greeks, and the fimple Afp'tratc, 

 not only u(ed in the Greek but in many other languages. Of the 

 organs of her mouth (lie told me fhe made little or no ufe ; and the 

 principal organ of it, the tongue, (he did not ufe at all till Ihe came 

 to France, except to affift her in fwallowing. The founds, there- 

 fore, of the language of her country muft have been the moll fi.iiple 

 founds of which we can conceive any language to be comj)ofed : 

 For (he muft have fpoken with open mouth, that is with no 

 ufe of the lips, as the Hurons, a nation of North America, fpeak, 

 and her language muft have come as near as polfible to mere animal 

 cries. I hold it, therefore, to have been one of the firft languages 

 invented, and the beginning of the art : So that, 1 think, by my 

 converfation with this woman, 1 have difcovered the very origin of 

 language. 



This Wild Girl was one of the three great curiofities, concerning 

 the human fpecies, which I have feen. The firll of ihefe was Peter 

 ihe Wild Bo)\ who was, as I have faid, altogether in the original flate, 

 of men upon this earth; for he was folitary, living upon the natur- 

 al fruits of the earth, without cloaths, houfes, the ufe of Ipeech 



or 



* See Vol. IV. particularly Book I. Chap, II. and the Appendix to that volume,— 

 alfo Vol. I. of-Origin of Language, p. 193^ 



