tates navy, who have
visited the islands in question, that such is not the case. Among the
Indians, Mongolians, and Negroes I have found no noteworthy exceptions.
I have inquired among mothers who have raised families to ascertain when
they first observed this sign as an expression among their children; and
from the consensus of opinion it appears that this is about the first
sign used by infants to express negation.

[Sidenote: THE POSITIVE SIGN]

I have not found the positive sign, or sign of affirmation, by a nod of
the head, to be so general, yet it has a wide range within the human
family, and appears to be used to some extent among the lower primates.

Seeking a source from which these signs may have originated, I have
concluded that they may arise from two circumstances. The negative sign
doubtless comes from an effort to turn the head away from something
which is not desired, and that with such an intent it has gradually
crystallised into an instinctive expression of negation or refusal;
while the nod of affirmation or approval may have grown out of the
intuitive lowering of the head, as an act of submission or acquiescence,
or from reaching the head forward to receive something desired, or they
may have come from these two causes conjointly.

[Sidenote: ALPHABET FOR SIMIAN SPEECH]

This is only one of a great many points in which the speech of Simians
coincides with that of man. It is true we have no letters in our
alphabet with which to represent the sounds of their speech, nor have we
the phonetic equivalence of their speech in our language; but it is also
true that our alphabet does not fully represent or correctly express the
entire phonetic range of our own speech; but the fact that our speech is
not founded upon the same phonetic basis, or built up into the same
phonetic structures, is no reason that their speech is not as truly
speech as our own. That there are no letters in any alphabet which
represent the phonetic elements of Simian speech, is doubtless due to
the fact that there has never been any demand for such; but the same
genius which invented an alphabet for human speech, actuated by the same
motives and led by the same incentives, could as easily invent an
alphabet for Simian speech. It is not only true that the phonetic
elements of our language are not represented by the characters of our
alphabet, but the same is true to some extent of our words, which do not
quite keep pace with human t