The Practical Linguist / 'Wild Children' and the critical period Marshall R. Childs Special to The Daily Yomiuri The winter of January 1800 was cold in Aveyron, France, especially if you lived day and night in the forest, eating what food you could find. On Jan. 9, out of the forest came a boy, naked except for the tatters of a shirt, wary of people, and above all hungry. Unable to speak human l..