impatient, her thumb and two of her fore-fingers.
In this latter case we have a good instance, like those given in a
former chapter, of the inheritance of a trick or gesture; for no one, I
presume, will attribute to mere coincidence so peculiar a habit as
this, which was common to the grandfather and his two grandchildren who
had never seen him.
Considering all the circumstances with reference to these children
shrugging their shoulders, it can hardly be doubted that they have
inherited the habit from their French progenitors, although they have
only one quarter French blood in their veins, and although their
grandfather did not often shrug his shoulders. There is nothing very
unusual, though the fact is interesting, in these children having
gained by inheritance a habit during early youth, and then
discontinuing it; for it is of frequent occurrence with many kinds of
animals that certain characters are retained for a period by the young,
and are then lost.
As it appeared to me at one time improbable in a high degree that so
complex a gesture as shrugging the shoulders, together with the
accompanying movements, should be innate, I was anxious to ascertain
whether the blind and deaf Laura Bridgman, who could not have learnt
the habit by imitation, practised it. And I have heard, through Dr.
Innes, from a lady who has lately had charge of her, that she does
shrug her shoulders, turn in her elbows, and raise her eyebrows in the
same manner as other people, and under the same circumstances. I was
also anxious to learn whether this gesture was practised by the various
races of man, especially by those who never have had much intercourse
with Europeans. We shall see that they act in this manner; but it
appears that the gesture is sometimes confined to merely raising or
shrugging the shoulders, without the other movements.
Mr. Scott has frequently seen this gesture in the Bengalees and
Dhangars (the latter constituting a distinct race) who are employed in
the Botanic Garden at Calcutta; when, for instance, they have declared
that they could not do some work, such as lifting a heavy weight. He
ordered a Bengalee to climb a lofty tree; but the man, with a shrug of
his shoulders and a lateral shake of his head, said he could not. Mr.
Scott knowing that the man was lazy, thought he could, and insisted on
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