662 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



of five years and nine months had a kitten of which he was very- 

 fond. One day, after two or three days' absence from the house, 

 it came back with one foot much mutilated and the leg swollen, 

 evidently not far from dying. "When" (writes the mother) "he 

 saw it, he burst into uncontrollable tears, and was more affected 

 than I have ever seen him. The kitten was taken away and 

 drowned, and ever since (a month) he has shown great reluctance 

 in speaking of it, and never mentions it to any one but those who 

 saw the cat at the time. He says it is too sad to tell any one of 



it." The boy C , when only four, was moved to passionate grief 



at the sight of a dead dog taken from a pond. 



The righteous indignation of children at the doings of the 

 butcher, the hunter, and others, which deserves a chapter to itself, 

 shows how deeply pitiful consideration for animals is rooted in 

 their hearts. 



It is sometimes asked why children should take animals to 

 their bosoms in this fashion, and lavish so much fellow-feeling 

 on them. It seems easy to understand how they come to choose 

 animals, especially young ones, as playmates, and now and again 

 to be ruthlessly inconsiderate of their comfort in their boisterous 

 gambols ; but why should they be so affected by their sufferings 

 and champion their rights so zealously ? I think the answer is 

 not hard to find. The sympathy and love which the child gives 

 to animals grows out of a kind of blind, gregarious instinct, and 

 this again seems to be rooted in a similarity of position and needs. 

 As M. Compayre well says on this point : " He (the child) sympa- 

 thizes naturally with creatures which resemble him on so many 

 sides, in wjaich he finds wants analogous to his own, the same 

 appetite, the same impulses to movement, the same desire for 

 caresses. To resemble is already to love." * I think, however, 

 that a deeper feeling comes in from the first and gathers strength 

 as the child hears about men's treatment of animals I mean a 

 sense of a common danger and helplessness face to face with the 

 human " giants." The more passionate attachment of the child 

 to the animal is the outcome of the widespread instinct of help- 

 less things to band together. A mother once remarked to her 



boy, between five and six years old, " Why, R , I believe you 



are kinder to the animals than to me ! " " Perhaps I am " (he re- 

 plied) ; " you see they are not so well off as you are." May there 

 not be something of this sense of banding and mutual defense on 

 the animals' side too ? The idea does not look so absurd when we 

 remember how responsive, how forbearing, how ready to defend 

 a dog will often show itself toward a " wee mite " of a child. 



The same outpourings of affection are seen in the dealings of 



* Op. tit., p. 108. 



