The Speech of Monkeys

[Sidenote: PUCK'S VOICE AND ACTIONS] A little later I adjusted my apparatus for another trial, and this time I hung a small mirror just above the mouth of the horn. Then retiring again from the room I left him to examine his new surroundings, and he soon discovered the new monkey in the glass and began to caress and chatter to it. After a while I started the phonograph again by means of the string, and when the horn began to deliver its Simian oration it appeared to disconcert and perplex Puck. He would look at the image in the glass, then he would look into the horn; he would retire with a feeble grunt and a kind of inquisitive grin, showing his little white teeth, and acting as though in doubt whether to regard the affair as a joke, or to treat it as a grim and scientific fact. His voice and actions were exactly like those of a child, declaring in words that he was not afraid, but betraying fear in every act, and finally blending his feelings into a genuine cry. Puck did not cry, but the evidence of fear made the grin on his face rather ghostly. Again he would approach the mirror, then listen to the sounds which came from the horn, and it appeared from his conduct that there was a conflict somewhere. It was evident that he did not believe that the monkey which he saw in the glass was making the sounds which came from the horn.