THE SPEECH OF MONKEYS. IO3 



generally very vicious. I have not succeeded in 

 making any very good records of these monkeys, 

 although I have observed, without the aid of the 

 phonograph, that they have one or two very dis- 

 tinct and well-marked sounds. I have not up to 

 this time attempted to differentiate their sounds, 

 but in a general way have interpreted the mean- 

 ings of one or two groups of them, especially 

 those of a friendly character. I may with pro- 

 priety remark here that in all the different 

 tongues of monkeys there appear to be certain 

 words which are much more significant — that is, 

 of a much better phonetic type than the others, 

 and which occur much more frequently among 

 their sounds. This appears to be true of the 

 speech or sounds of all the lower animals. 



In a former chapter I have described the happy 

 little family in Central Park, which consisted of 

 the five little brown cousins only a few months 

 ago ; but death has reduced their number to two. 

 In this connection I shall mention a very im- 

 portant fact concerning the use of the natural 

 senses of these animals. I have several times 

 been assured that monkeys depended more upon 

 their sense of smell than upon that of sight as 

 a means of recognition; and that in this respect 



