progress to it, and, also the world at large, to this only and always
universal language. To both the deaf, as well as the dumb, its
advantages have ever been apparent.

Therefore, from prehistoric times, and from the beginning of the world,
we may presume to have had in some form or another, the Pantomimic Art.
In the lower stages of humanity, even in our own times, there is, in all
probability, a close similarity to the savagedom of mankind in the early
Antediluvian period as "This is shown (says Darwin) by the pleasure
which they all take in dancing, rude music, painting, tattooing, and
otherwise decorating themselves--in their mutual comprehension of
_gesture language_, and by the same inarticulate cries, when they are
excited by various emotions." It naturally follows that even if there
was only dancing, there must necessarily, as a form of entertainment,
have also been Pantomime. Again, all savage tribes have a war-dance of
some description, in which in fighting costume they invariably go
through, in Pantomimic form, the respective movements of the Challenge,
the Conflict, the Pursuit, and the Defeat, whilst other members of the
tribe, both men and women, give additional stimulus to these
representations by a rude form of music.

The Ostyak tribe of Northern Asia give us a specimen of the rude
imitative dances of early civilization in a Pantomimic exhibition of the
Chase; the gambols and habits of the wolf and other wild beasts. The
Pantomimic dances of the Kamchadales are in imitation of birds, dogs,
and bears; and the Damaras represent, by four of the tribe stooping down
with their heads together, and uttering harsh cries, the movements of
oxen, and of sheep. The Australian Bushmen Mimic the leaping of calves,
the antics of the baboon, and the buzzing of swarms of bees. Primitive
Pantomimic dancing is practised amongst the South Sea Islanders, and