Captain Cook Has Compared It To A Man Clearing His
Throat, But Certainly No European Ever Cleared His Throat
With So Many Hoarse, Guttural, And Clicking Sounds.
They are excellent mimics:
As often as we coughed or
yawned, or made any odd motion, they immediately imitated
us. Some of our party began to squint and look awry; but
one of the young Fuegians (whose whole face was painted
black, excepting a white band across his eyes) succeeded in
making far more hideous grimaces. They could repeat with
perfect correctness each word in any sentence we addressed
them, and they remembered such words for some time. Yet
we Europeans all know how difficult it is to distinguish
apart the sounds in a foreign language. Which of us, for
instance, could follow an American Indian through a sentence
of more than three words? All savages appear to possess, to
an uncommon degree, this power of mimicry. I was told,
almost in the same words, of the same ludicrous habit among
the Caffres; the Australians, likewise, have long been notorious
for being able to imitate and describe the gait of any
man, so that he may be recognized. How can this faculty be
explained? is it a consequence of the more practised habits
of perception and keener senses, common to all men in a
savage state, as compared with those long civilized?
When a song was struck up by our party, I thought the
Fuegians would have fallen down with astonishment. With
equal surprise they viewed our dancing; but one of the
young men, when asked, had no objection to a little waltzing.
Little accustomed to Europeans as they appeared to be, yet
they knew and dreaded our fire-arms; nothing would tempt
them to take a gun in their hands.
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