The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1895-04-12


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acter of the Signs of the monkeys; but I
/ leave to my colleagues of the future the
care of arranging these details which ap-
pear to me to be of secondary interest.
ITO observe the gradual approach from
the sign language toward the phonetic
language in the case Of the monkey is to
I point out the first steps toward civiliza-
ton. Is it not the solving of the problem
of the origin of languages, which only re-
| Gently a skeptic declared to be insolvable?
| For my part, convinced as I am of the i'm
| portance of these studies attracted by
the vast horizon which they open, 1 would
wish to confine all my efforts toward
them.
MY opinion Is that the monkey at the
! present time does not express himself by
articulate sounds. The differences that
! have noticed between his cries of joy, of
| pain and of anger were always i'm intona-
| ton, and never in articulation. But 1 be-
lieve that the conformation of this animal
presenting no obstacle TO the pronuncia-
ton of words, it is solely TO the absence Of
| favorable circumstances that we. must at
| tribute the check of his development in
this sense"
The Reporter-Then the monkey is a
| talker who has simply missed the chance
| of revealing himself as such?
Prof. Laborde-Precisely. The opport-
! tunities would make the conditions of sur
roundngs, of existence, Of reproduction
| somewhat modified. Could we transform
them artifcially? I think so; in fact, l
| firmly believe it. And that is what 1 tried
to do in DEMONSTRATING a few of my ami
I vr-ae
to preserve my young subjects in this
! climate. They all died just about the
time when they began to reveal interest
| ing traits. Nevertheless, 1 have been abe
| to discover a few curious facts My first
efforts were with an African dog-faced
monkey that we called Gnou-Gnou. He
was remarkable for his faculties Of imi-
tation; but this kind of monkey is COM
mon to all his kind; and If l call attention
to it, it is simply to mention that wnen he
stole my instruments and tried to make
use of them in his own fashion, he al
ways brought back to each one on the
verbal demand without ever making
mistake. In. his cage 1 placed three re-
ceptacles for his pittance, a cup for his
milk, a basket for his oranges, and
plate for his cakes. When you approach
ed him and said: "Gnou-Gnou, 1 am
going to give you an orange" he present
ed the basket. If you brought him milk
he grabbed his cup, and all that without
/ a mistake.
by these examples and others. that
would be too long to refer to, l became
| convinced that almost all our usual words
had a meaning for Gnou-Gnou.
Although the chimpanzee Juiette,
which all Paris went to admire last
year, was not trained by scientific men,
one cannot fail to remark the curious
results that her owners obtained from
her training. Julette was remarkable
affectionate, She would kiss you, just
like a child. She slept in a regular BED.
She took her food just like her foster par
ents, and among other acts which gave
evidence of an intellectual effort some
what complicated, 1 may cite the follow
ing: When her master rolled a cigarette
and placed it In her hand, and at the
same time asked her what was to be done
with that, she Immediately put 1t into
his mouth In this way through a very
short training, through the simple asso,
citation of her life with human existence,
the faculties of the little creature were
increased TO such degree, that when I
afterward dissected her 1 found that
she had an abnormal development of the
third circonvolu of the brain.
with Zizi, another monkey my efforts
were directed toward final aim. / ina
gined that had found a method to make
him substitute the articulations of sylla-
bles for his sign language. And, although
1 did not succeed in this matter, 1 am
still satisfied that with two conditions easy
to obtain, the thing could be accomplished
Let me explain. The monkey is by lem
permanent essentially VISUAL and with him
all images must be of the visual order
His memory, being consequently VISUAL
can retain sounds only imperfectly and
conform itself imperfectly to the auditive
mechanism Of auditiVe images. This or
ganization, found in every simiesque spe-
c.es. is not rare in man. remember, for
instance, that my friend Gambetta would
be unable to make his marvellous speeches
if he did not have before his eyes a sort of
drawing in which he mad made a resume
of his ideas in h:eroglyphics that looked
Hike anything but writing, which, never
theIess, had for him the very figures of
his sentences. This proves that what is
sometimes only an accident in the case of
man, is the law, the natural law, in the
case of the monkey. He is too much alb
sorbed by forms to pay attention to the
revelations of his ear. This being estab-
hshed, I have come TO the conclusion that
1T would be necessary to force the atten-
ton of the monkey to auditive impress
e,ions and have tried to isolate him from
tangible objects by keeping him in OBSCURE
ty. | put out all the lights in my OBJ
seyvatory. I took the animal beside me
and talked to him.
AT the end of a little time he began to
put intonations in his cries, and, Ike the
monkey Of a boatman that once examined
he was advancing toward his first bah
blings But unfortunately he died.
ITO succeed in this interesting expert
ment the first condition would be % pro-
long the existence Of the monkey 20 the
adult period. The second. II the attempt
were TO be carried 10 the fullest extent,
would also be Indispensable II would be
necessary TO plunge the monkey IN perpet-
ual obscurlty 10 make him blind and the
necessity Of such a painful operation
would certainly form barrier 20 nay ex-
perlments Ia order 10 treat my subjects
with such cruelty, / would have 20 feel
that they were Jess close than they are
70 my own humanity"