THE SPEECH OF MONKEYS. If? 



experiments, as they are yet crude and, in some 

 cases, the deductions therefrom not positively 

 certain. From the various records that I have 

 made of the voices of men and monkeys, I am 

 prepared to say that the difference is not so great 

 as is commonly supposed, and that I have con- 

 verted each into the other. I would not be un- 

 derstood, to say that I have done this with all 

 their sounds, nor that the monkeys' sounds were 

 converted into human speech, but the funda- 

 mental sounds of each were changed into those 

 of the other. I find that human laughter coin- 

 cides in nearly every point with that of monkeys. 

 It differs in volume and pitch. By the aid of 

 the phonograph I have been able to analyze the 

 vowel sounds of human speech, which I find to be 

 compound, and some of them contain as many as 

 three distinct syllables of unlike sounds. From 

 the vowel basis I have succeeded in developing 

 certain consonant elements, both initial and final, 

 from which I have deduced the belief that the 

 most complex sounds of consonants are developed 

 from the simple vowel basis, somewhat like chem- 

 ical compounds result from the union of simple 

 elements. Without describing in detail the re- 

 sults, I shall mention some simple experiments 



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