The Popular Science Monthly, June, 1900: Vol. 57, May, 1900 to October, 1900Various
Science
The Popular Science Monthly, June, 1900: Vol. 57, May, 1900 to October, 1900
Various
Science -- Periodicals; Technology -- Periodicals
I was particularly struck with the fact that when asking for food by
the word _mum_ he gave to it (I will copy the words written down at
the time), “a most strongly marked interrogatory sound at the end.” He
also gave to “Ah,” which he chiefly used at first when recognizing
any person or his own image in a mirror, an exclamatory sound, such as
we employ when surprised. I remark in my notes that the use of these
intonations seemed to have arisen instinctively, and I regret that
more observations were not made on this subject. I record, however,
in my notes that at a rather later period, when between eighteen and
twenty-one months old, he modulated his voice in refusing peremptorily
to do anything by a defiant whine, so as to express, “That I won’t;”
and again his humph of assent expressed, “Yes, to be sure.” M. Taine
also insists strongly on the highly expressive tones of the sounds
made by his infant before she had learned to speak. The interrogatory
sound which my child gave to the word _mum_ when asking for food is
especially curious; for, if any one will use a single word or a short
sentence in this manner, he will find that the musical pitch of his
voice rises considerably at the close. I did not then see that this
fact bears on the view which I have elsewhere maintained that before
man used articulate language, he uttered notes in a true musical scale,
as does the anthropoid ape Hylobates.
Finally, the wants of an infant are at first made intelligible
by instinctive cries, which after a time are modified in part
unconsciously, and in part, as I believe, voluntarily as a means of
communication,--by the unconscious expression of the features--by
gestures and in a marked manner by different intonations,--lastly by
words of general nature invented by himself, then of a more precise
nature imitated from those which he hears; and these are acquired at a
wonderfully quick rate. An infant understands to a certain extent, and
as I believe, at a very early period, the meaning or feeling of those
who tend him, by the expression of their features. There can hardly be
a doubt about this with respect to smiling; and it seemed to me that
the infant whose biography I have here given understood a compassionate
expression at a little over five months old. When six months and eleven
days old, he certainly showed sympathy with his nurse on her pretending
to cry. When pleased after performing some new accomplishment, being
then almost a year old, he evidently studied the expression of those
around him. It was probably due to differences of expression and not
merely of the form of the features that certain faces clearly pleased
him much more than others, even at so early an age as a little over
six months. Before he was a year old, he understood intonations and
gestures, as well as several words and short sentences. He understood
one word, namely, his nurse’s name, exactly five months before he
invented his first word, _mum_; and this is what might have been
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