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188
The Speech of Monkeys
·
R. L. Garner
145
I
believe
if
we
could
apply
the
rule
of
perspectives
and
throw
our
vanishing
point
far
back
beyond
the
chasm
that
separates
man
from
his
Simian
prototype,
that
we
would
find
one
unbroken
outline
tangent
to
every
circle
of
life
from
man
to
protozoa
in
language,
mind,
and
matter.
CHAPTER
XXIII.
The
Human
Voice--Human
Bagpipe--Human
Piccolo,
Flute,
and
Fife--The
Voice
as
a
Whistle--Music
and
Noise--Dr.
Bell
and
his
"Visible
Speech."
One
of
the
very
curious
feats
which
I
have
performed
with
the
phonograph
is
the
conversion
of
the
human
voice
into
the
sounds
of
various
instruments.
I
had
my
wife
sing
the
familiar
Scotch
ballad,
"Comin'
through
the
Rye,"
to
the
phonograph
while
the
cylinder
was
rotating
at
the
rate
of
about
forty
revolutions
per
minute.
Each
word
in
the
song
was
distinctly
pronounced
and
the
music
rendered
in
a
plain,
smooth
tone.
I
then
increased
the
speed
of
the
machine
to
about
one
hundred
and
twenty
per
minute,
at
which
rate
I
reproduced
the
song.
It
was
a
very
perfect
imitation
of
the
bagpipe
with
no
sign
whatever
of
articulation.
The
melody
was
preserved
with
only
a
change
of
time.
The
speech
character
was
so
completely
destroyed
that
I
repeated
this
record
to
a
large
audience
in
which
were
several
eminent
musicians,
not
one
of
whom
suspected
that
it
was
not
a
real
bagpipe
solo.
In
like
manner
I
have
converted
the
sounds
of
the
voice
into
a
very
perfect
piccolo,
flute,
fife,
and
into
a
fairly
good
imitation
of
a
whistle
sound.
To
produce
the
whistling
effect
and
the
fife
sound
the
rate
of
speed
must
be
necessarily
very
high,
and
some
notes
will
not
be
perfectly
converted
for
some
reason
which
I
have
not
yet
fully
understood.
Some
voices
are
much
more
easily
converted
into
the
flute
effect
than
others.
To
get
the
best
flute
sounds,
a
full,
smooth,
mezzo-soprano
gives
the
best
effect.
In
reversing
the
operation,
the
sounds
of
these
instruments
can
be
made
to
imitate
the
human
voice
somewhat,
but
not
exactly,
not
only
in
the
fact
that
the
modulation
is
wanting
and
there
is
no
semblance
to
consonant
sounds,
but
the
tone
itself
differs
in
quality
from
that
of
the
voice.
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