the words of modern oral speech are in inverse
proportion to the general culture, it seems established that they do
not bear that or any constant proportion to the development of the
several languages with which gesture is still more or less associated.
The statement has frequently been made that gesture is yet to some
highly-advanced languages a necessary modifying factor, and that
only when a language has become so artificial as to be completely
expressible in written signs--indeed, has been remodeled through their
long familiar use--can the bodily signs be wholly dispensed with. The
evidence for this statement is now doubted, and it is safer to
affirm that a common use of gesture depends more upon the sociologic
conditions of the speakers than upon the degree of copiousness of
their oral speech.

USE BY OTHER PEOPLES THAN NORTH AMERICAN INDIANS.

The nearest approach to a general rule which it is now proposed to
hazard is that where people speaking precisely the same dialect are
not numerous, and are thrown into constant contact on equal terms with
others of differing dialects and languages, gesture is necessarily
resorted to for converse with the latter, and remains for an
indefinite time as a habit or accomplishment among themselves,
while large bodies enjoying common speech, and either isolated from
foreigners, or, when in contact with them, so dominant as to compel
the learning and adoption of their own tongue, become impassive in its
delivery. The ungesturing English, long insular, and now rulers
when spread over continents, may be compared with the profusely
gesticulating Italians dwelling in a maze of dialects and subject for
centuries either to foreign rule or to the influx of strangers on whom
they depended. So common is the use of gestures in Italy, especially
among the lower and uneducated classes, that utterance without them
seems to be nearly impossible. The driver or boatman will often,
on being addressed, involuntarily drop the reins or oars, at the
risk of a serious accident, to respond with his arms and fingers
in accompaniment of his tongue. Nor is the habit confined to the
uneducated. King Ferdinand returning to Naples after the revolt of
1821, and finding that the boisterous multitude would not allow his
voice to be heard, resorted successfully to a royal address in signs,
giving reproaches, threats, admonitions, pardon, and dismissal, to
the entire satisfaction of the assembled lazzaroni. T