PECULIAR TO MAN. 121 



tuatlon, his history affords a striking and useful caution, by 

 exhibiting the uncertainty of human testimony and historical 

 evidence. No two accounts agree in the year, season, and 

 place of his discovery ; and later printed histories contain 

 serious narratives of George I. having found him in hunting 

 at Herrenhausen, or in the Harz ; that it was necessary to 

 cut down the tree, in the top of which he had taken refuge; 

 that his body was covered with hair, and that he ran on all 

 fours ; that he jumped about trees like a squirrel, knew how 

 to get the bait out of traps placed for wolves ; that he was 

 carried over to England in an iron cage, learned to speak in 

 nine months at the court of the Queen, was baptized at the 

 house of Dr. Arbuthnot, and soon after died, &c. &c. 



Peter was as upright in his attitude, and as invariably 

 biped, as any of ourselves ; and the same remark holds good 

 of all the other authentic examples ; as of the girl described 

 by Condamine*, aman found in the Pyreneesf, and theboyt 

 met with near Aveyron, and brought to Paris soon after the 

 Revolution. On the other hand, where they have been de- 

 scribed as going on all-fours, suspicious circumstances occur 

 in the narration, calculated to throw discredit on the whole. 

 Such is the case with Linn.'eus's j uvenis oi;i?m5 Hibernus, 

 taken from Tulpius, Observat, Medicar, lib. iv. cap. 9. He 

 is said to have been brought up " inter oves sylvestres," and 

 thence to have acquired " natura ovilla :" he is described 

 further as " ferox ac indomitus viiltu truci,'' &c. 



An unprejudiced examination of all these cases, putting 

 aside what is obviously exaggerated or fabulous, proves that 

 they are merely instances of defective organization; mal- 

 formed individuals, incapable of speech, and exhibiting few 

 and imperfect mental phenomena ; pathological specimens, 

 therefore, rather than examples of human perfection. No- 

 thing can be conceived more widely removed from the natu- 

 ral condition of man, than these half-witted beings ; and 

 we might as rationally adopt any monstrous birth for a 



* Histoire d'unejeune Fille Sauvage, 12mo. Paris, 1761. 



+ Leroy Exploitation de la Nature dans les Pyrenees ; 4to. 177 6, p. 8. 



■^ Historical Account of the young Savage of Aveyronf\2mo> 



