Association with man through countless generations has taught domestic animals not only the fact of their safety when giving voice, but also that very often there is great virtue in a vigorous outcry. With an insistent staccato neigh, the hungry horse jars the dull brain of its laggard master, and prompts him to "feed and water the stock." But how different is the cry of a lost horse, which calls for rescue. It cannot be imitated in printed words; but every plainsman knows the shrill and prolonged trumpet-call of distress that can be heard a mile or more, understandingly.
And think of the vocabulary of the domestic chicken! Years of life in fancied security have developed a highly useful vocabulary of language calls and cries. The most important, and the best known, are the following:
"Beware the hawk!"—"Coor! Coor!" "Murder! Help!"—"Kee- owk! Kee-owk! Kee-owk!" "Come on"—"Cluck! Cluck! Cluck!" "Food here! Food!"—"Cook-cook-cook-cook!" Announcement, or alarm—"Cut-cut-cut-dah-cut!" But does the wild jungle-fowl, the ancestor of our domestic chicken, indulge in all those noisy expressions of thought and feeling? By no means. I have lived for months in jungles where my hut was surrounded by jungle-fowl, and shot many of them for my table; but the only vocal sound I ever heard from their small throats was the absurdly shrill bantam-like crow of the cock. And even that led to several fatalities in the ranks of Gallus stanleyi.
Domestic cattle, swine and fowls have each a language of their own, and as far as they go they are almost as clear-cut and understandable as the talk of human beings. Just how much more is behind the veil that limits our understanding we cannot say; but no doubt there is a great deal.
But it is with the language of wild animals that we are most concerned. As already pointed out, wild creatures, other than song-birds, do not care to say much, because of the danger of attracting enemies that will exterminate them. Herein lies the extreme difficulty of ascertaining how wild beasts communicate. In the Animallai Hills of southern India I hunted constantly for many weeks through forests actually teeming with big game. There were herds upon herds of elephants, gaur, axis deer, sambar deer, monkeys by the hundred, and a good sprinkling of bears, wild hogs and tigers.
We saw hundreds upon hundreds of animals; but with the exception of the big black monkeys that used to swear at us, I can almost count upon my fingers the whole number of times that we heard animals raise their voices to communicate with each other.
Ape Voices. Naturally it is of interest to know something of the voices of the animals that physically and mentally stand nearest to man.
The wild gorilla has a voice almost equal to that of the chimpanzee, but in captivity he rarely utters any vocal sound other than a shriek, or scream.
The baby orang-utan either whines or shrieks like a human child. The half-grown or adult orang when profoundly excited bellows or roars, in a deep bass voice. Usually, however, it is a persistently silent animal.
The chimpanzee has a voice, and vociferously expresses its emotions.