142 UOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY. 



RECORDED INSTANCES OF CHILDREN HAVING BEEN 

 NOURISHED BY WOLVES AND BIRDS OF PREY. 



By Jivanji Jamshedji Modi. 



(Road at the Society's Meeting on 7th May 1889.) 



The wolf is, as its very name shows, a ferocious and blood-thirsty 

 animal. The word is the same as the Sanscrit Vrka (Z. Veherka Pe and 

 P gurg and Lat. Vulpes), and comes from an old Aryan root, vraec, 

 ( 5^3" ), to tear off. Though by nature a ferocious animal as implied 

 by the root of the word, it is susceptible of entertaining towards 

 mankind maternal or human feelings. This paper is intended to 

 describe a case of this tender feeling as recorded in India, and to 

 state a few similar cases, as narrated in old classical literature, of 

 wolves and birds of prey. 



I was travelling in Northern India in the early part of 

 1887, and when I was at Agra at the end of March, I was attracted 

 to a place known as the Secundra, which contained a tomb of 

 Mariam, a Christian wife of the great Akbar, who had, in accordance 

 with his views, of tolerating different religions, taken to his 

 harem wives of different nationalities. I went there to see if 

 there was anything specially Christian in the tomb of that queen, as 

 there was something specially Hindoo in the royal chambers of his 

 Hindoo wife at Fatehpur Sikri. Though I saw nothing there specially 

 Christian, I was delighted with my visit to that place, as 1 saw 

 there a man who was generally known as the wolf-boy. A boy 

 of the Secundra Church Mission Orphanage, which is located 

 there, drew my attention to this man, whose history reminded me of 

 what I had read in classical literature of ferocious and blood-thirsty 

 animals turning at times tender and kind-hearted. 1 will describe 

 the history of this boy in the words of the Rev. Mr. Lewis, who 

 published a short history of the Secundra Orphanage in 1885. He 

 says of this boy: — " On February 4th, 18o7, he was sent to the Superin- 

 tendent of the Orphanage by the Magistrate of Bulandshahr, with 

 the statement that he had been taken out of a wolf's hole or den. 

 Some natives, it turned out on further enquiry, had been travelling by 

 some unfrequented part of the jungle in the Bulandshahr districtand 

 had been surprised to see a small boy, of five or six years of age, walk- 

 ing about on his hands and feet. On drawing near to see this strange 

 sight, they were amazed to see the boy disappear quickly within the 

 interior of a largo hole, which, on close inspection, turned out to be 



