The author then proceeds to furnish other corroborative instances; but the above quotations are, I think, sufficient for my purposes.[88] For they show (1) that the spontaneous and to all appearances arbitrary word-making, which is more or less observable in all children when first beginning to speak, may, under favourable circumstances, proceed to an astonishing degree of fulness and efficiency; (2) that although the words, or articulate signs, thus invented are sometimes of a plainly onomatopoetic origin, as a general rule they are not so; (3) that the words are far from being always monosyllabic; (4) that they admit of becoming sufficiently numerous and varied to constitute a not inefficient language, without as yet having advanced to the inflexional stage; and (5) that the syntax of this language presents obvious points of resemblance to that of the gesture-languages of mankind previously considered. CHAPTER VIII. RELATION OF TONE AND GESTURE TO WORDS. We have already seen that spoken language differs from the language of tone and gesture in being, as a system of signs, more purely conventional. This means that for semiotic purposes articulation is a higher product of mental evolution than either gesticulation or intonation. It also means that as an instrument of such evolution articulate speech is more efficient. The latter point is an important one, so I shall proceed to deal with it at some length. As noticed in a previous chapter, our system of coinage, bank-notes, and bills of sale is a more convenient system of signifying value of labour or of property, than is the more primitive and less conventional system of actually exchanging the labour or bartering the property; and our system of arithmetic is similarly more convenient for the purpose of calculation than is the more natural system of counting on the fingers. But not only are these more conventional systems more convenient; they are likewise conducive to a higher development of business transactions on the one hand, and of calculation on the other. In the absence of such an improved system of signs, it would be impossible to conduct as many or such intricate transactions and calculations as we do conduct. Similarly with speech as distinguished from gesture. Words, like gestures, are signs of thoughts and feelings; but in being more conventional they are more pure as signs, and so admit of being wrought up into a much more convenient or efficient system, while at the same time they become more constructive in their influence upon ideation. The great superiority of words over gestures in both these respects may most easily be shown by the use of a few examples. I open Colonel Mallery’s book at random, and find the following as the sign for a barking dog:—