Eleanor Stackhouse Atkinson

“ Not only because they are made of the same stuff, and because they have similar habits, are animals that look so different supposed to belong to the same great family, but there are many "connecting links" between different animals, like the fish that fly. Go far enough down the tree of life and you will find where one branch of the family is connected with some other branch that seems as different as can be. ”

“ Fish and birds, the owl and the pussy cat, all belong to one great family—the back-boned family. But among the back-boned family those that suckle their young, as the cat does, are higher than thosethat do not. Animals and people learn and go up higher in life, in proportion as they are sociable. A mother and her babies are sociable with one another. ”

“ They really do climb trees to get the food that a little insect brother, the bee, gathers and makes over in its own body to feed itsyoung just as mama bear gives milk out of her own body to feed her cubs.
How did animals and plants come to be so much like other animals and plants; and plants and animals so much like each other in shape, in their way of growing, moving and feeding and reproducing? Why does the growth of every tree keep showing us how many different kinds of things each little seed can grow into—root, bark, leaf, blossom, fruit? ”

“ As we have seen that the lowest forms of life, both animal and vegetable, begin in the water so, in each new class of animals, there is this same grading up. Each begins as a water kind, goes up to land kinds, and then to tree kinds. ”

“ One answer is that all things are related to one another, branched out from the same beginning, just as great families grow into brothers and sisters, uncles and aunts; cousins and second cousins—differing more and more, as a rule, as they are more distantly related. ”

“ Among the birds there is the duck that lives most of the time in the water. He swims more than he flies. Then there are the long-legged, long-billed birds that live most of the time on the edge of the water. ”

“ Notice how, in still another way, Nature seems to want to make sure that we see that we are all relations and should be kind to one another and find joy in studying each other's lives and in making these lives as happy and helpful as possible. ”

“ There are other birds that build their nests in bushes or low trees near the water, and get their food from the seeds that grow on water plants or by catching fish or other water animals. Higher up are other birds that build their nests on the dry land in the meadow far away from the water. Others build in the bushes, higher up ”

“ They love each other and they teach each other. The mama cat learns to be shrewd and careful because she has other little mouths to feed and lives to protect, beside her own. It is just as true in the insect world. ”

“ They know how to do many wonderful things, and these wonderful things are most of them done in taking care of their eggs, and the babies that are hatched out of these eggs.
And do you know about how these ants keep other insects for cows? These "cow" insects are the little green lice that you find on plants. They are not good for the plants but they make good "cows." They give down a kind of honey dew, just as the old cow gives milk for her babies. ”