The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals: A Book of Personal Observations — John Shaqi
The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals: A Book of Personal ObservationsHornaday, William T. (William Temple)
Science
The Minds and Manners of Wild Animals: A Book of Personal Observations
Hornaday, William T. (William Temple)
Animal behavior
"Beware the hawk!"--"Coor! Coor!" "Murder! Help!"--"Kee-
_owk_! Kee-_owk_! Kee-_owk_!" "Come on"--"Cluck!
Cluck! Cluck!" "Food here! Food!"--"Cook-cook-cook-cook!"
Announcement, or alarm--"Cut-cut-cut-_dah_-cut!" But does
the wild jungle-fowl, the ancestor of our domestic chicken,
indulge in all those noisy expressions of thought and feeling? By
no means. I have lived for months in jungles where my hut was
surrounded by jungle-fowl, and shot many of them for my table; but
the only vocal sound I ever heard from their small throats was the
absurdly shrill bantam-like crow of the cock. And even that led to
several fatalities in the ranks of _Gallus stanleyi_.
Domestic cattle, swine and fowls have each a language of their
own, and as far as they go they are almost as clear-cut and
understandable as the talk of human beings. Just how much more is
behind the veil that limits our understanding we cannot say; but
no doubt there is a great deal.
But it is with the language of wild animals that we are most
concerned. As already pointed out, wild creatures, other than
song-birds, do not care to say much, because of the danger of
attracting enemies that will exterminate them. Herein lies the
extreme difficulty of ascertaining how wild beasts communicate.
In the Animallai Hills of southern India I hunted constantly for
many weeks through forests actually teeming with big game. There
were herds upon herds of elephants, gaur, axis deer, sambar deer,
monkeys by the hundred, and a good sprinkling of bears, wild hogs
and tigers.
We saw hundreds upon hundreds of animals; but with the exception
of the big black monkeys that used to swear at us, I can almost
count upon my fingers the whole number of times that we heard
animals raise their voices to communicate with each other.
Ape Voices. Naturally it is of interest to know something of the
voices of the animals that physically and mentally stand nearest
to man.
The wild gorilla has a voice almost equal to that of the
chimpanzee, but in captivity he rarely utters any vocal sound
other than a shriek, or scream.
The baby orang-utan either whines or shrieks like a human child.
The half-grown or adult orang when profoundly excited bellows or
roars, in a deep bass voice. Usually, however, it is a
persistently silent animal.
The chimpanzee has a voice, and vociferously expresses its
emotions.
First and most often is the plaintive, coaxing note, "Who'-oo!
who'-oo! who'-oo!"
Then comes the angry and threatening, "Wah', wah', wah-!
_Wah'_-hool _Wah'_-hool"
Lastly we hear the fearful, high-pitched yell or shriek, "Ah-h-h-
h!" or "E-e-e-e."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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