34 SIGNS HAVING SPECIAL INTEREST. 



with the hands closed. An invitation to a general or systematic barter or 

 trade, as distinct from one transaction, is expressed by repeated taps or the 

 use of more fingers. The rough resemblance of this sign to that for " cut- 

 tine * has occasioned mistakes as to its origin. It is reported by Captain 

 Burton as the conception of one smart trader cutting into the profits of 

 another — " diamond cut diamond." The trade sign is, on the plains, often 

 used to express the white man — vocally named Shwop — a legacy from the 

 traders, who were the first Caucasians met. Generally, however, the ges- 

 ture for white man is by designating the hat or head-covering of civilization. 

 This the French deaf-mutes apply to all men, as distinct from women. 



INSTANCES OF SIGNS HAVING SPECIAL INTEREST. 



A few signs have been selected which are not remarkable either for 

 general or limited acceptance, but are of interest from special conception 

 or peculiar figuration. 



The relation of brothers, sisters, and of brother and sister, children of 

 the same mother, is signified by putting the two first finger tips in the 

 mouth, denoting the nourishment taken from the same breast. (Burton; 

 Dorsey.) One of the signs for child or infant is to place the thumb and fin- 

 gers of the right hand against the lips, then drawing them away and bringing 

 the right hand against the left fore-arm, as if holding an infant (Din/bar.) 

 The Cistercian monks, vowed to silence, and the Egyptian hieroglyphers, 

 notably in the designation of Horus, their dawn-god, used the finger in or 

 on the lips for "child." It has been conjectured in the last instance that 

 the gesture implied, not the mode of taking nourishment, but inability to 

 speak— in-fans. This conjecture, however, was only made to explain the 

 blunder of the Gi-eeks, who saw in the hand placed connected with the 

 mouth in the hieroglyph of Horus (the) son, " Hor-(p)-chrot," the gesture 

 familiar to themselves of a finger on the lips to express "silence," and so mis- 

 talcing both the name and the characterization, invented the God of Silence, 

 Harpokrates. A careful examination of all the linear hieroglyphs given by 

 Ciiampollion (Dictionnaire Egyptien), shows that the finger or the hand to 

 the mouth of an adult (whose posture is always distinct from that of a child) 

 is always in connection with the positive ideas of voice, mouth, speech, 



