Part 5 (1/2)
CHAPTER VIII
”The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals” followed ”The Descent of Man” in 1872 The ested it was the desire to explain the complexities of expression on evolution principles But the study of eed Darwin's attention at least froians and the Gauchos had vividly roused his iinative faculties; and his direct observations commenced as early as 1838; when he was already inclined to believe in evolution, and were continued at intervals ever after The third edition of Sir Charles Bell's ”Anatoreatly adhout based on the conviction that species came into existence in their present condition; and notwithstanding that Bain and Herbert Spencer had made considerable advances in a treaty, an exhaustive book anted, which should throw on Expression the new and interesting light of Darwinism
What was Darwin's method? Observation, cleverly devised appeal to nature; observation over a wide field as to the varied races ofthe aid of travellers and residents in many lands; observation of domestic animals in familiar and in untried circumstances; observation of infants, especially his own, froe; observation of the insane, who are liable to the strongest passions, and give them uncontrolled vent It was in 1867 that Darwin circulated his group of questions designed to ascertain theevery emotion, and their physical concoravings, afforded little evidence, because beauty is their ly contracted facial ht as to natives who had had little coht not have destroyed ancestral and original expression
The result was to develop three principles which appeared, in coestures involuntarily used by man and animals The first was that of serviceable associated habits: certain co soratify and relieve certain sensations, desires, &c, whenever the sa is repeated, there is a tendency to the sah they may not then be of the least use The second principle, that of antithesis, is the converse of the last; when an opposite state of mind is induced, there is an involuntary tendency to directly opposite h of no use The third principle, that of the direct action of the nervous syste generated in excess by strong e all these principles we discover how every thought and every circureat naturalist seem to have been utilised in his life work ”I have noticed that persons in describing a horrid sight, often shut their eyes momentarily and firmly, or shake their heads as if not to see, or to drive away, so in the dark of a horrid spectacle, closingto recollect a painter's na, and then to the opposite corner, arching the one eyebrow on that side, although of course there was nothing to be seen there” ”Many years ago I laid a s h they all declared that they invariably did so; accordingly they all took a pinch, but froh their eyes watered, and all, without exception, had to pay lass-plate in front of a puff-adder in the Zoological Gardens, with the fir back if the snake struck at me; but as soon as the bloas struck, , and I ju rapidity My will and reason were powerless against the ier which had never been experienced” ”I observed that though ht old, they certainly did not alink their eyes, and I believe never did so The start of an older infant apparently represents a vague catching hold of so I shook a pasteboard box close before the eyes of one of my infants, when 114 days old, and it did not in the least wink; but when I put a few co it in the same position as before, and rattled them, the child blinked its eyes violently every tis and horses under many circumstances atched Cats and monkeys were most carefully scrutinised At alle a boy who had just shot his first snipe on the wing, and his hands treht, that he could not for soun;” an instance of an eeous
So the best portions of his writing; as when he speaks of a mother whose infant has been intentionally injured, ”how she starts up with threatening aspect, how her eyes sparkle and her face reddens, how her boso a mourner when quiescent, he says: ”The sufferer sits ently rocks to and fro; the circulation becohs are drawn All this reacts on the brain, and prostration soon folloith collapsedfeatures of this book is the evidence it affords of Darwin's acuteness and persistence in observation during his travels, and of the excellence of his ht froht on the bleak Cordillera, had the hair all over their bodies as erect as under the greatest terror” He noted that Jeian, blushed when he was quizzed about the care which he took in polishi+ng his shoes, and in otherwise adorning hi after is fitted into the theory of blushi+ng Guanacoes in South A to bite, but merely to spit their offensive saliva fron of their anger; and Darwin found the hides of several which he shot in Patagonia, deeply scored by teeth marks, in consequence of their battles with each other A party of natives in Tierra del Fuego endeavoured to explain that their friend, the captain of a sealing vessel, was out of spirits, by pulling down their cheeks with both hands, so as toas possible; and the fact is treasured till it co of features under depression As if he foreknew that he should want the fact forty years later, he inquired of Je was practised by his people, and learnt that it was unknown to the in parts of South Aerous from the presence of Indians, how incessantly--yet as it appeared, unconsciously--the half-wild Gauchos closely scanned the whole horizon”
”In Tierra del Fuego, a native touched with his finger so at our bivouac, and plainly showed utter disgust at its softness; whilst I felt utter disgust at h his hands did not appear dirty”
And this illustrates the pri offensive to the taste
In later years his own children, and his domestic pets, were incessantly watched, and suitable experi out the real nature of their expressions The period at which tears are for, the contraction of theat objects, the various stages of s, the effects of shyness, shame, and fear, are all set before us, as thus observed For instance, ”I asked one of my boys to shout as loudly as he possibly could, and as soon as he began he fir the eyes) I observed this repeatedly, and on asking him why he had every time so firmly closed his eyes, I found that he was quite unaware of the fact: he had acted instinctively or unconsciously” Some of his early observations were afterwards published by Darwin in _Mind_, vol ii, under the title of ”A Biographical Sketch of an Infant”
Here is a carefully-worded and very suggestive experiical Gardens, I placed a looking-glass on the floor before two young orangs, who, as far as it was known, had never before seen one At first they gazed at their own ied their point of view They then approached close, and protruded their lips towards the ie, as if to kiss it, in exactly the same manner as they had previously done towards each other when first placed, a few days before, in the sarimaces, and put themselves in various attitudes before the mirror; they pressed and rubbed the surface; they placed their hands at different distances behind it; looked behind it; and finally seehtened, started a little, becaer” So monkeys were tested with a dressed doll, a live turtle, and stuffed snakes, &c
The mode and purpose of erection of the hair, feathers, and deres of animals were the subject of much careful inquiry
Chimpanzees, monkeys, baboons, and ical Gardens A stuffed snake taken into the monkey-house caused several species to bristle When Darwin showed the sa its back A cassowary erected its feathers at sight of an ant-eater
Every unexpected occurrence was pressed into service Witness the following anecdote: ”One dayon an open field He raised his head so high that his neck became almost perpendicular; and this he did from habit, for the machine lay on a slope below, and could not have been seen withof the head; nor if any sound had proceeded from it could the sound have been more distinctly heard His eyes and ears were directed intently forwards; and I could feel through the saddle the palpitations of his heart With red, dilated nostrils, he snorted violently, and whirling round, would have dashed off at full speed had I not prevented him”
We see, too, in this book the results of Darwin's extensive reading
The novelists are laid considerably under contribution, their power of describing expressive signs of e particularly appreciated
dickens, Walter Scott, Mrs Oliphant, and Mrs Gaskell are a the novelists quoted; while the author of Job, Ho, Sir Joshua Reynolds, and many other deceased writers, illustrate the subject The living authorities--scientific ly nuet, Professor Huxley, Mr Herbert Spencer, Sir J
Crichton Browne, Sir Samuel Baker, Sir Joseph Lister, Professors Cope and Asa Gray, andchapters in the book is that dealing with blushi+ng It is shown to depend on self-attention, excited almost exclusively by the opinion of others ”Every one feels blame more acutely than praise Nohenever we know, or suppose, that others are depreciating our personal appearance, our attention is strongly draards ourselves, more especially to our faces” This excites the nerve centres receiving sensory nerve for the face, and in turn relaxes the blood capillaries, and fills the are much more affected than the old, and women more than men, and why the opposite sexes especially excite each others' blushes It becomes obvious why personal re, and why the most powerful of all the causes is shyness; for shyness relates to the presence and opinion of others, and the shy are always reat result made clear by Darwin is that the muscles of expression have not been created or developed for the sake of expression only, and that every true or inherited in All the chief expressions are proved to be essentially the sau descended fro the tone of the pages which close the book, describing as they do the probable expressions of our early ancestors, their utility, the value of differences of physiognons of emotion The subject, says the author, ”deserves still further attention, especially froist;” and so si human interest, a text-book for novelists and students of huress in obedience to the behest ”Know thyself”
To fully measure the merit of one so far elevated above ordinary nise the undeniable greatness of a great man, and learn all that is possible from hiiven a judght to quote: ”To ourselves it almost seems one of the most wonderful of the many wonderful aspects of Mr Darwin's varied work that by the sheer force of some exalted kind of common-sense, unassisted by any special acquaintance with psychological ht down upon soht to light in the region of mental science”[12] These truths are specified as the influence of natural selection in the forin of Species;” the evolution of mind and of morals, in the ”Descent of Man,” considered by the late Professor Clifford as containing the simplest and clearest and most profound philosophy that was ever written on the subject; and the evolution of expression in the book described in this chapter Thus, says Mr Roence, the science of coy may be said to owe its foundation to Darwin
FOOTNOTES:
[12: G J Romanes, in ”Charles Darwin,” memorial notices reprinted from _Nature_]
CHAPTER IX
In 1875 appeared another great work from the master's pen, ”Insectivorous Plants,” which was destined to place in a yet ht the many-sidedness and fertility of his mind As usual Darwin tells us that this work dated fro the sue a nuht by the leaves of the common sun-dew (_Drosera rotundifolia_) on a heath in Sussex I had heard that insects were thus caught, but knew nothing further on the subject I gathered by chance a dozen plants, bearing fifty-six fully expanded leaves, and on thirty-one of these dead insects or re, the discoverer scarcely knehat It was evident to hi insects, and that the nuhtered annually ht this have upon the problele for existence?
A masterly series of experi that sun-dews and a number of other plants obtain the bulk of their nourish insects