Translations:Victor of Aveyron/36/en

Other indications of an insulated, precarious, and wandering life, were deduced from the nature and number of the scars with which the body of this child was covered. Without mentioning that which was seen on the forepart of his neck, and of which I shall take notice hereafter, as coming from another cause, and deserving particular attention, we reckoned four on the face, six along the left arm, three at some distance from the left shoulder, four at the circumference of the pubis, one on his left thigh, three on one leg, and two on the other; which together make twenty-three scars. — Some of these appeared to have come from the bites of animals, others from scratches and excoriations, more or less large and deep; numerous and indelible testimonies of a long and total abandonment of this unfortunate youth, and which, considered under a point of view more general and philosophical, bear witness as much against the weakness and insufficiency of man, given over wholly to his own resources, as they are favorable to the resources of Nature, which, according to laws apparently contradictory, labors openly to renew and preserve that which she tends secretly to waste and destroy. If we add to all these facts, taken from observation, those, not less authentic, which the country people witnessed, who lived near the woods in which the child was discovered, we shall find that, when he was first taken into society, he lived on acorns, potatoes, and raw chestnuts; that he never threw out the husks; that despite the most active vigilance he was many times very near to escaping; that he exhibited, at first, great unwillingness to lie in a bed, & c. We shall find, moreover, that he had been seen more than five years before, entirely naked, and flying at the approach of men; which supposes that he had been already, at his first appearance, habituated to that kind of life, which could not be the result only of an abode of two years or less, in uninhabited places. Thus, this child passed, in absolute solitude, almost seven years out of twelve, which appeared to be his age when he was caught in the woods of Caune. It was therefore probable, and almost certain, that he had been abandoned when he was about four or five years old; and if at that period, he had already obtained some ideas, and the knowledge of some words, as the beginning of education, these, would have been obliterated from his memory, resulting in his insulated situation.