THE LANGUAGE OF MONKEYS.

Dunstan Times, Issue 2486, 21 June 1909, Page 2

THE LANGUAGE OF MONKEYS.

A scientific writer has been giving an account of the language of monkeys, of which perhaps- the only other student is Professor Garner, who has twice visited Africa for the purpose of acquiring the monkey language. In the way of language, monkeys manifest their passions, emotions, desires, and fears'by cries and gestures, emphasised by significant accents, which vary with the species. Monkeys and children, to-, gether with savages and uneducated people of civilised nations, manifest an inclination to mimic the gestures and motions of all persons whom they see. This trait is especially prominent in monkeys, but thousands, of instances might be cited to show that mankind, old and young, share it with them. The attitude and the sagacity of monkeys are so human that some savages believe that it is out of maliciousness that they do not talk. ■ In fact, a monkey might pass for a dumb man, because he does not articulate the consonants clearly, as we/ do; but not all men have this power of, articulation in an equal degree. We have seen those who are stammerers by birth and by habit. Some savage tribes have a scanty alphabet, complicated by clicks and nasal and guttural sounds that cannot be imagined till they are heard. All monkeys have voices, and many of them have very strong ones. Excepting the solitary and taciturn organutan, the species which, live in troops are chatterers, and keep up a great hubbub. The principal tones of their noisy and rapid language, with the frequent repetition of the same sounds, may also be found in the languages of the most savage peoples. They are, for the most part, complex, guttural, and harsh articulations, with few variations. But the alphabets of some of the African and Melanesian nations are not much richer. In both it is generally the labials—p, b, w—which are wanting. In the tongue of the brown' capuchin monkey, the most important word sounds something like “who,” uttered like “wh 00-w.” The meaning of the sound is food, which is the central thought of every monkey’s life. The word may be taken somewhat broadly, for it not only refers to the article of food, but to the desire of eating. Another word, which means drink, begins with a faint guttural “ch,” resembling the French diphthong eu, and ends in "y ” . . Laughter is not wholly peculiar to men, for some monkeys have a noisy and‘explosive laugh analogous to ours. Cook has stated that natives of the New Hebrides express their joy by a kind of guttural whistle, analogous to the jerky, rattling laugh of some monkeys. Monkeys are also capable of showing sorrow and weeping; and it is possible to follow in their faces the equivalents of the physiognomical changes which in man answer to the expression of his various emotions. Among these are the drawing back of the corners of the mouth and the contraction of the lower -eyelid, which constitute the monkey’s smile, and the depression of the eyebrow and forehead in anger. Professor Garner’s achievement in discovering the elements of the monkey, language has had’ its natural sequence in one of the zoological gardens of Stuttgart, where a keeper is trying to teach a cduplo of chimpanzees to write. When he for the first time showed them the use of a lead-pencil they seemed tograsp his idea at once, and with the utmost gravity covered the paper with strokes and lines. They were intensely interested, and seemed to know that there was some mystery about writing. Their way of holding the pencil was as rational as that of most little children, and they seemed to delight in showing the public their work. / _ , The chimpanzee is the ape which has been most closely studied by scientists. Brehm has cultivated the society of chimpanzees for several years and says: “This, apa cannot be treated as an animal. Ho is an animal, no doubt, yet he, shows so many human trails that- OH6 forgets the beast. His body is animal, to be suie, but his mind is that of an uncivilised man. The chimpanzee imitates after the manner of a man. If only , his hand were as flexible as the human hand he could learn to do many things which only man can The West African tribes have a legend that the chimpanzees once belonged to their communities, but that they were expelled for bad behaviour, and gradually sank to their, present low level.