44 THE GESTUEE-LANGUAGE. 



liar; and^ moreover, appropriate words were commonly sung 

 while the mimic acted, so that he could apply all his skill to 

 giving artistic illustrations of the tale as it went on. The pan- 

 tomimic performances of Southern Europe may be taken as 

 representing in some degree the ancient art, but it is likely 

 that the mimicry in the modern ballet and the Eastern pan- 

 tomimic plays falls much below the classical standard of 

 excellence. 



I have now noticed what I venture to call the principal 

 dialects of the gesture-language. It is fit, however, that, 

 gesture-signs having been spoken of as forming a complete 

 and independent language by themselves, something should 

 be said of their use as an accompaniment to spoken language. 

 We in England make comparatively little use of these signs, 

 but they have been and are in use in all quarters of the world 

 as highly important aids to conversation. Thus, Captain Cook 

 says of the Tahitians, after mentioning their habit of counting 

 upon their fingers, that " in other instances, we observed that, 

 when they were conversing with each other, they joined signs 

 to their words, which were so expressive that a stranger might 

 easily apprehend their meaning ;"i and Charlevoix describes, 

 in almost the same words, the expressive pantomime with 

 which an Indian orator accompanied his discourse.^ 



Gesticulation goes along with speech, to explain and em- 

 phasize it, among all mankind. Savage and half - civilized 

 races accompany their talk with expressive pantomime much 

 more than nations of higher culture. The continual gesticu- 

 lation of Hindoos, Arabs, Neapolitans, as contrasted with the 

 more northern nations of Europe, strikes every traveller who 

 sees them. But we cannot lay down a rule that gesticulation 

 decreases as civilization advances, and say, for instance, that a 

 Southern Frenchman, because his talk is illustrated with ges- 

 tures, as a book with pictures, is less civilized than a German 

 or an Englishman. 



We English are perhaps poorer in the gesture-language than 

 any other people in the world. We use a form of words to 



' Cook, First Voyage, iii Hawkesworth's Voyages ; London, 1773, vol. ii. p. 228. 

 = Cliarlevoix, vol. i. p. 413. 



