Parent animal

“ Owing to the imperfection of language the offspring is termed a new animal, but is in truth a branch or elongation of the parent; since a part of the embryon-animal is, or was, a part of the parent; and therefore in strict language it cannot be said to be entirely new at the time of its production; and therefore it may retain some of the habits of the parent-system. ”

“ Every such fellow-animal of ours, besides having eyes to see with, and a brain which, if it does not tell him as many things as our brains tell us, yet teaches him all that he need know to follow the laws that Heart of Nature has set for him, has the same feelings and affections as ourselves. Parent birds love each other and their little ones, and often lose their lives in trying to protect them. They build their homes with as much care and skill as House People use in making theirs. ”

“ Or again, as when the horns of cross-bred cattle have been affected by the shape of the horns of either parent. For the welfare of a very young animal, as long as it remains in its mother's womb, or in the egg, or as long as it is nourished and protected by its parent, it must be quite unimportant whether most of its characters are fully acquired a little earlier or later in life. ”

“ There can be but little question that in all cases of animals under natural conditions such behaviour has an instinctive basis. Though the effect may be to establish a means of communication, such is not their conscious purpose at the outset. They are presumably congenital and hereditary modes of emotional expression which serve to evoke responsive behaviour in another animal—the reciprocal action being generally in its primary origin between mate and mate, between parent and offspring, or between members of the same family group. ”

“ If, now, such an animal were allowed to breed with another—whether operated upon in the same manner or not—it would be seen that young which are born, apparently perfectly healthy, present a few days after birth all the phenomena observed in their changed parent or parents. ”

“ The parent who sedulously endeavours to form the heart and enlarge the understanding of his child, has given that dignity to the discharge of a duty, common to the whole animal world, that only reason can give. This is the parental affection of humanity, and leaves instinctive natural affection far behind. ”

“ And is not the mother-passion among the mammals even more interesting? It is as if the watcher in the woods went out to see the mother animal only. It is her going and coming that we follow; her faring, foraging, and watch-care that let us deepest into the secrets of wild animal life. ”

“ If this family in their progress from the nest to the sea, happen to be interrupted by any person, the young ones, it is said, seek the first shelter, and squat close down, and the parent birds fly off; then commences that truly curious scene dictated by an instinct analogous to reason, the same as has been already noticed in the mallard and the partridge; the tender mother drops at no great distance from her helpless brood, trails herself along the ground, flaps it with her wings, and appears to struggle as if she were wounded, in order to attract attention, and tempt a pursuit after her. ”

“ One of the most striking circumstances with regard both to the general and the special instincts of the Dog, namely, those instincts common to the whole species, and those possessed by particular breeds, is the way in which they are transmitted from parent to child. ”

“ We have stated that the male Dog is perfectly oblivious of his paternal duties; we have, however, met with one instance of a Dog, who, whatever may have been his qualities as a parent, discharged with great fidelity the part of guardian, and that, too, not to one of his own species, but to one of an alien and hostile race. This curious instance of canine affection was exhibited by a small male pet Spaniel, belonging to some friends of ours, who brought up a kitten. ”

“ They say—and such is the fact—that the howling of a dog bears a resemblance to the voice of the young alligator, and that the old ones are attracted towards the spot where it is heard—the mother to protect it, and the male parent to devour it! ”

“ I should begin with very young children by pointing to similarities of structure and function between themselves and the family cat or dog. They have eyes, ears, tongues, etc.; they see, hear, taste, feel pain, and experience pleasure just as children do; therefore, let us recognize their rights, avoid giving them pain, and increase their pleasures. I strongly advocate each family having some one animal, at least, to be brought up with the household to some extent, whether it be bird, cat, or dog. ”

“ The extension of knowledge from the bird to the mammal may be made through the medium of the family pets. Fido, puss, the pet rabbits, or squirrels may serve to elucidate the subject. Indeed, at this stage the well-instructed child himself will be ready to give all the essential facts, and will feel free to ask questions concerning the facts he does not understand. If he has traced the continuity of the egg from the flower to the bird it will not be difficult for him to realize that even the higher animal has its origin in the same way. ”

“ As the child increases in knowledge and reason, the horse, cows, poultry, and other domestic animals come under his notice. These do not ordinarily express their hunger or other sufferings by cries of distress, but depend more on the developed reason and humanity of man. And here the parent is called upon to instruct a child in the nature and wants of each, that he may intelligently provide for their sustenance and for their protection from injury and disease. ”

“ Picture the family life of the innocent little creatures—a lesson indeed to people of larger growth; how they guard their nests with almost human care and wisdom, and how they cherish their young with as faithful and self-sacrificing love as parents of human families. Impress upon their young minds how many days of toil the mother-bird, aided by her mate, spent in building the nest which they purpose to rifle, of her joy and pride when the first egg was deposited, and all the patiently borne days of brooding which followed. ”

“ There are some possibilities of exception, but still, speaking broadly, I may say that this is the way in which all our varied races of domestic animals have arisen; and you must understand that it is not one peculiarity or one characteristic alone in which animals may vary. There is not a single peculiarity or characteristic of any kind, bodily or mental, in which offspring may not vary to a certain extent from the parent and other animals. ”

“ The proverb has it that the thistle does not bring forth grapes; so, among ourselves, there is always a likeness, more or less marked and distinct, between children and their parents. That is a matter of familiar and ordinary observation. We notice the same thing occurring in the cases of the domestic animals–dogs, for instance, and their offspring. In all these cases of propagation and perpetuation, there seems to be a tendency in the offspring to take the characters of the parental organisms. ”

“ Kid’s dog—by the way,” with cheerful interest, “has the dog a name?— Kid’s dog, nameless—buries the secret of the lost child’s parentage in innermost recesses of his being. Unknown father fails to claim offspring and I am asked to assume his duties. ”

“ Another question now arises, would the foster-parents follow up and support the bird as they do their own young when they leave the nest? or do the parent Cuckoos or any of them take any immediate charge of the young at this stage? Again, how do they commence to gather food for themselves? ”

“ The family, offspring of the instincts that preside over the preservation of the species, exists, temporarily at least, among birds and mammals, not to go lower. It coexists with the feeling of maternal love, and in certain cases of paternal love, raised to the highest degree. ”

“ Animals think a great deal in taking care of their young. What care the hen exercises over her brood of chickens! She has some of the same thoughts and feelings of love that a mother has in taking care of her child. And the bird, that has her little ones in the nest, has many thoughts about them as she goes out to gather food, and then wings her way back to put it into their open mouths. ”

“ Animals differ as widely in their instinctive faculties as men in their judgments; which partly explains why one setter readily follows his master’s word or hand, or enters into his mood, while another remains hopelessly dumb or unresponsive. The telepathic faculty appears more frequently, as we shall see, among birds or animals that habitually live in flocks or herds, and I have always witnessed its most striking or impressive manifestation between a mother animal and her young, as if some prenatal influence or control were still at work. ”

“ Alexander Hill has recently sympathetically approached this subject, and we give one extract in his own words:—"If we try to figure to ourselves the mental activities of any animal, we recognize at once that its thought must take the colour of the sense by which they are chiefly prompted. A Dog, for example, does not recognize 'a family likeness,' but a family smell. In a day of happy wandering down the village street, and through the lanes, it pays no attention to the picturesque. ”

“ The mother leads them in search of food, covers them at night with her wings, and evinces the greatest care and affection towards them on the least appearance of danger, trying by every art in her power to draw the attention of her enemies to herself, feigning lameness, tumbling and rolling about as if severely wounded, and by this means generally succeeding in saving them. The little ones squat at the least chuck of alarm from the mother, and lie so close as to suffer one to catch them in the hand, should he chance to discover them, which, however, it is very difficult to do. ”

“ So are all the sons and daughters of mammals. Whether they come into the world among the waters or among the desert sands, in the hollow of a tree, in a hole in the earth, or in a palace, the children of mammals are frail and pitiful, and they survive to grow and multiply only because they are the object of the loving and incessant sacrifices of a mother. ”

“ On the other hand, while still attached to the mother, the little ones seize the prey, which they share in their turn with their parent by means of the communication Nature has arranged between the two organisms. ”

“ But, before speaking of man, it will be well to investigate conjugal union and the family amongst the animals nearest to man—the mammals.
From the point of view of duration and strength of the affections, or that which we as men should call their morality, the mammals are far from occupying the first rank in the animal hierarchy; many birds are very superior to them. ”

“ The principle, so fruitful in important social consequences among animals, that the offspring owes its parentage jointly to two individuals of different sexes, or, in other words, must always have a father and a mother, equally prevails in the vegetable kingdom. ”

“ Animal Breeding.—It has been pointed out that the domestication of wild animals, the horse, cattle, sheep, goats, and the dog, marked a great advance in civilization in the history of the earth's peoples. As the young of these animals came to be bred in captivity the peoples owning them would undoubtedly pick out the strongest and best of the offspring, killing off the others for food. ”

“ Similarly the young mammal is developed within the body of the maternal organism to a point where it is able to perform the primitive functions of life. For weeks, months or even years, according to the class of the animal, it must be supported and protected by its parents. ”

“ I allude to the circumstance of a favourite dog having died after producing a litter of puppies, which were adopted, suckled, and brought up by a young bitch of the same breed, who never had any whelps of her own, or indeed was in the way of having any. The flow of milk of the foster-mother was quite sufficient for the sustenance of the adopted offspring, and enabled her to support and bring them up with as much care and affection as if they had been her own. ”

“ The higher we search in the scale of animal life, the more numerous and striking become the instances of the love and care shown by parents for their children. Among the fishes and the frogs and toads, for example, there are such wonderful instances of this that we must deal with each of these groups separately. ”

“ The greatest care in this world is that of the family. You know with what continual and laborious solicitude the hen watches over her little ones, with what self-sacrifice the mother spends herself in order to keep her nest of eggs warm. If pains were not taken to remove her from the nest and make her eat, she would let herself starve to death, sacrificing her own life for the sake of her eggs. ”

“ Further on in the process of development we note the love of offspring, and, as a consequence of that love, the growth of the family sense, which rarely is maintained beyond the time when the young can shift for themselves. Among the species of the higher groups—certain insects, the greater part of the birds, and the nobler of the mammals—the instinct of the family is extended until it includes the tribe, or perhaps goes yet further and leads to a certain kindliness to all the individuals of the race. ”

“ My mother and father were gentle, bookish creatures with no understanding of animals. Even if a pony had to be bought for us children, every male thing of the family—uncles, nephews, tenth cousins—was summoned from every corner of England for his advice and experience. ”

“ We have the dog, the cat, the horse and other originally wild animals given into our care — brought to us for affection and help. Why? That we may train them out of their ferocity, and into a higher and more intelligent state of life — that we may evoke in them devotion, affection and intellect. ”