304 VOCAL LANGUAGE. 



circumstances.' And after any of his exhibitions he indulged 

 in self-gratulation, * as if aware that he had shown himself 

 off to some advantage.' 



Again, the parroquet whose talents are so lovingly and 

 admiringly described by Lady Clementina Davies made 

 sensible, well-timed comments for instance, on its food. 

 Not only did it possess the gift of speech, but it had the 

 additional accomplishment of knowing more than one spoken 

 language of man. It swore when enraged, and it could 

 venture to abuse both in French and English those who 

 affronted it. 



And, what is even more interesting and less objectionable, 

 after recovering from an illness its talk became excited and 

 incoherent a circumstance having a most important bearing 

 on delusion, delirium, and mania in the lower animals. 

 Pierquin long ago pointed out a correlative fact that not 

 only do certain birds acquire a certain power or knowledge 

 of human language, but that the loss of such acquired 

 language accompanies disuse or want of practice, as well 

 as bodily or mental disorder, just as in man. 



A knowledge of foreign languages, though commonest in, 

 is not restricted to, the parrot; for a Senegal jackdaw, at one 

 of the Crystal Pajace bird shows in 1875, 'not only spoke 

 English but French too ' ( Animal World '). 



Professor Low describes a parrot belonging to a hostelry 

 as calling for the waiter or hostler, according to the cha- 

 racter of the arrivals at the inn on foot or on horseback, 

 in carriages or in carts. 



The parrot, unfortunately, does not always display its 

 power of speech for good purposes, for among the ends 

 which this accomplishment is occasionally made to subserve 

 are mendacity, deception, jeering, swearing, mischief, and 

 practical joking (Jesse). It picks up man's oaths with as 

 great readiness as his pious ejaculations, and uses them 

 with all man's emphasis and theatrical effect. 



Starlings and ravens have also been described as using 

 man's words with a consciousness of their purport, and this 

 even without man's teaching by spontaneous imitation, 

 observation, reflection (Biichner). 



