The Speech of Monkeys

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" 219 CHAPTER XXIV. Some Curious Facts in Vocal Growth--Children and Consonants--Single, Double, and Treble Consonants--Sounds of Birds--Fishes and their Language--Insects and their Language 224 CHAPTER XXV. Facts and Fancies of Speech--Language in the Vegetable Kingdom--Language in the Mineral Kingdom 237 CHAPTER XXVI. THE SPEECH AND REASON OF DOMESTIC ANIMALS. Dash and the Baby--Two Collies talk--Eunice understands her Mistress--Two Dogs and the Phonograph--A Canine Family--Cats and Dogs--Insects--Signs and Sounds 246 THE SPEECH OF MONKEYS CHAPTER I. Early Impressions--First Observations of Monkeys--First Efforts to Learn their Speech--Barriers--The Phonograph Used--A Visit to Jokes--My Efforts to Speak to Him--The Sound of Alarm inspires Terror. From childhood, I have believed that all kinds of animals have some mode of speech by which they could talk among their own kind, and have often wondered why man had never tried to learn it. I often wondered how it occurred to man to whistle to a horse or dog instead of using some sound more like their own; and even yet I am at a loss to know how such a sound has ever become a fixed means of calling these animals. I was not alone in my belief that all animals had some way to make known to others some certain things; but to my mind the means had never been well defined. [Sidenote: FIRST OBSERVATIONS OF MONKEYS]