remarked, it is scarcely possible to point out any difference between
the tear-stained face of a person after a paroxysm of excessive
laughter and after a bitter crying-fit.[815] It is probably due to the
close similarity of the spasmodic movements caused by these widely
different emotions that hysteric patients alternately cry and laugh
with violence, and that young children sometimes pass suddenly from the
one to the other state. Mr. Swinhoe informs me that he has often seen
the Chinese, when suffering from deep grief, burst out into hysterical
fits of laughter.
I was anxious to know whether tears are freely shed during excessive
laughter by most of the races of men, and I hear from my correspondents
that this is the case. One instance was observed with the Hindoos, and
they themselves said that it often occurred. So it is with the Chinese.
The women of a wild tribe of Malays in the Malacca peninsula, sometimes
shed tears when they laugh heartily, though this seldom occurs. With
the Dyaks of Borneo it must frequently be the case, at least with the
women, for I hear from the Rajah C. Brooke that it is a common
expression with them to say we nearly made tears from laughter. The
aborigines of Australia express their emotions freely, and they are
described by my correspondents as jumping about and clapping their
hands for joy, and as often roaring with laughter. No less than four
observers have seen their eyes freely watering on such occasions; and
in one instance the tears rolled down their cheeks. Mr. Bulmer, a
missionary in a remote part of Victoria, remarks, that they have a
keen sense of the ridiculous; they are excellent mimics, and when one
of them is able to imitate the peculiarities of some absent member of
the tribe, it is very common to hear all in the camp convulsed with
laughter. With Europeans hardly anything excites laughter so easily as
mimicry; and it is rather curious to find the same fact with the
savages of Australia, who constitute one of the most distinct races in
the world.
In Southern Africa with two tribes of Kafirs, especially with the
women, their eyes often fill with tears during laughter. Gaika, the
brother of the chief Sandilli, answers my query on this head, with the
words, Yes, that is their common practice. Sir Andrew Smith has seen
the painted face of a Hottentot woman all furrowed with tears after a
fit of laughter. In Northern Africa, with the Abyssinians, tears are
secreted under the same circumstances. Lastly, in North America, the
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