NATURAL HISTORY STUDIES 



milk to the young ones as well as sharpening teeth 

 and claws. It includes all the new moves in 

 parental care, in the kindliness of kindred, in co- 

 operation and mutual aid. Instead of making a 

 contrast between " struggle for self " and " struggle 

 for others," it is more accurate to see that endeavours 

 in either direction are among the possible answers 

 back that living creatures make to the difficulties 

 and limitations that beset them. In many cases the 

 kin-instinct is as clear and as commanding as the 

 self -preservative instinct, and, in critical situations, 

 a solution may be found along either line or along 

 both. The world is indeed the abode of the strong, 

 but it is also the home of many feeble folk who 

 make up in love what they lack in strength. 



Ants are a little people, and all the world is against 

 them, but they have found success in forming 

 societies, and they are dreaded by much stronger 

 animals, even beyond the class of insects. Every 

 one knows that some kinds of ants go to war and 

 have great battles. But our picture of nature must 

 take its colour not only from the warfare, but also 

 from the other-regarding activities which the whole 

 life of the ant-hill illustrates. In many cases it 

 seems to be a law that an ant with a full crop must 

 never refuse to feed a hungry comrade. 



Mr. W. H. Hudson tells of the Viscachas burrow- 

 ing rodents of South America that when a farmer 

 destroys a burrow and buries the inhabitants under 

 a heap of earth, other Viscachas, coming from a 

 distance for there are frequent visits between 

 village and village dig out and save those that 



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