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النشر الإلكتروني

XIII.

MEANS OF THE EXPRESSION OF THE

Expression

of the Emo

tions, page 83.

EMOTIONS.

VOCAL ORGANS.

WITH many kinds of animals, man included, the vocal organs are efficient in the highest degree as a means of expression. We have seen in the last chapter that, when the sensorium is strongly excited, the muscles of the body are generally thrown into violent action; and, as a consequence, loud sounds are uttered, however silent the animal may generally be, and although the sounds may be of no use. Hares and rabbits, for instance, never, I believe, use their vocal organs, except in the extremity of suffering; as, when a wounded hare is killed by the sportsman, or when a young rabbit is caught by a stoat. Cattle and horses suffer great pain in silence, but when this is excessive, and especially when associated with terror, they utter fearful sounds.

That animals utter musical notes is faPage 87. miliar to every one, as we may daily hear in the singing of birds. It is a more remarkable fact that an ape, one of the Gibbons, produces an exact octave of musical sounds, ascending and descending the scale by

half-tones; so that this monkey, "alone of brute mammals, may be said to sing." From this fact, and from the analogy of other animals, I have been led to infer that the progenitors of man probably uttered musical tones before they had acquired the power of articulate speech; and that, consequently, when the voice is used under any strong emotion, it tends to assume, through the principle of association, a musical character.

Page 96.

ERECTION OF THE HAIR.

The enraged lion erects his mane. The bristling of the hair along the neck and back of the dog, and over the whole body of the cat, especially on the tail, is familiar to every one. With the cat it apparently occurs only under fear; with the dog, under anger and fear; but not, as far as I have observed, under abject fear, as when a dog is going to be flogged by a severe gamekeeper. If, however, the dog shows fight, as sometimes happens, up goes his hair. I have often noticed that the hair of a dog is particularly liable to rise if he is half angry and half afraid, as on beholding some object only indistinctly seen in the dusk.

Page 97.

Birds belonging to all the chief orders ruffle their feathers when angry or frightened. Every one must have seen two cocks, even quite young birds, preparing to fight with erected neck-hackles ; nor can these feathers when erected serve as a means of defense, for cock-fighters have found by experience that it is advantageous to trim them. The male Ruff (Machetes pugnax) likewise erects its collar of feathers when fighting. When a dog approaches a common hen with her chickens, she spreads out her wings, raises her tail, ruf

fles all her feathers, and, looking as ferocious as possible, dashes at the intruder.

Several kinds of snakes inflate themselves Page 105. when irritated. The puff-adder (Clotho arietans) is remarkable in this respect; but, I believe, after carefully watching these animals, that they do not act thus for the sake of increasing their apparent bulk, but simply for inhaling a large supply of air, so as to produce their surprisingly loud, harsh, and prolonged hissing sound.

Page 111.

ERECTION OF THE EARS.

The ears through their movements are highly expressive in many animals; but in some, such as man, the higher apes, and many ruminants, they fail in this respect. A slight difference in position serves to express in the plainest manner a different state of mind, as we may daily see in the dog; but we are here concerned only with the ears being drawn closely backward and pressed to the head. A savage frame of mind is thus shown, but only in the case of those animals which fight with their teeth; and the care which they take to prevent their ears being seized by their antagonists accounts for this position. Consequently, through habit and association, whenever they feel slightly savage, or pretend in their play to be savage, their ears are drawn back. That this is the true explanation may be inferred from the relation which exists in very many animals between their manner of fighting and the retraction of their

ears.

All the Carnivora fight with their canine teeth, and all, as far as I have observed, draw their ears back when feeling savage.

Expressions of the Emo

tions, page 130.

A STARTLED HORSE.

The actions of a horse when much startled are highly expressive. One day my horse was much frightened at a drilling-machine, covered by a tarpaulin, and lying on an open field. He raised. his head so high that his neck became almost perpendicular; and this he did from habit, for the machine lay on a slope below, and could not have been seen with more distinctness through the raising of the head; nor, if any sound had proceeded from it, could the sound have been more distinctly heard. His eyes and ears were directed intently forward; and I could feel through the saddle the palpitations of his heart. With red, dilated nostrils he snorted violently, and, whirling round, would have dashed off at full speed, had I not prevented him. The distention of the nostrils is not for the sake of scenting the source of danger, for, when a horse smells carefully at any object and is not alarmed, he does not dilate his nostrils. Owing to the presence of a valve in the throat, a horse when panting does not breathe through his open mouth, but through his nostrils; and these consequently have become endowed with great powers of expansion. This expansion of the nostrils, as well as the snorting, and the palpitations of the heart, are actions which have become firmly associated during a long series of generations with the emotion of terror; for terror has habitually led the horse to the most violent exertion in dashing away at full speed from the cause of danger.

Page 142.

MONKEY-SHINES.

Many years ago, in the Zoological Gardens, I placed a looking-glass on the floor before two young orangs, who, as far as it was known, had never

before seen one. At first they gazed at their own images with the most steady surprise, and often changed their point of view. They then approached close and protruded their lips toward the image, as if to kiss it, in exactly the same manner as they had previously done toward each other, when first placed, a few days before, in the same room. They next made all sorts of grimaces, and put themselves in various attitudes before the mirror; they pressed and rubbed the surface; they placed their hands at different distances behind it; looked behind it; and finally seemed almost frightened, started a little, became cross, and refused to look any longer.

When we try to perform some little action which is difficult and requires precision, for instance, to thread a needle, we generally close our lips firmly, for the sake, I presume, of not disturbing our movements by breathing; and I noticed the same action in a young orang. The poor little creature was sick, and was amusing itself by trying to kill the flies on the window-panes with its knuckles; this was difficult as the flies buzzed about, and at each attempt the lips were firmly compressed, and at the same time slightly protruded.

Expression

of the Emotions,

page 153.

WEEPING OF MAN AND BRUTE.

men.

Infants while young do not shed tears or weep, as is well known to nurses and medical This circumstance is not exclusively due to the lachrymal glands being as yet incapable of secreting tears. I first noticed this fact from having accidentally brushed with the cuff of my coat the open eye of one of my infants, when seventy-seven days old, causing this eye to water freely; and, though the child screamed violently, the other eye remained dry, or was only slightly

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