74 The Recapitulation Theory and Human Infancy 



mortality, provided it be understood that natural selection need 

 not always have produced an exact or refined adaptation. 



The value of parental care as a necessary condition to the emer- 

 gence of organisms of the higher types and the correspondence 

 of youthfulness with this higher organization is also acknowl- 

 edged by both writers. The greater capacity of the higher ani- 

 mals with the prolonged infancy period is due to a more or less 

 extensive education to fit them for the strenuous activities of 

 their life. This education varies with the different groups 

 and conforms to the necessities of circumstances and the mode 

 of living. To play is attributed a large importance in the prose- 

 cution of this education, and it is interesting to note that on the 

 mooted question as to whether young animals learn directly 

 from their parents both authorities speak with certainty in the 

 affirmative. Mitchell's description of imitation below the mon- 

 keys is, however, a carefully guarded one, and amounts to scarcely 

 more than a belief in organic predispositions to trial and error 

 modes of action which are in some degree encouraged and facili- 

 tated by the presence of similar action on the part of others. 

 With the apes this author holds for something akin to human 

 types of conscious imitation. 



In view of prevailing assumptions regarding the causes of the 

 duration of youth Mitchell's statement in this connection may 

 serve to call attention to the complexity of the facts and yet to 

 show the degree of truth in the assumed parallel between youth- 

 fulness and intelligence in the species. 



"The duration of youth in all [vertebrates] is settled by no 

 invariable chain of organic necessity. It has no relation to the 

 duration of the complete cycle of life from birth to death. It is 

 linked with size, but only in an indirect fashion, most apparent 

 in animals most akin. It is linked much more closely with 

 complexity of organization, so that the higher forms usually 

 take longer to mature than their near but lower relations. It is 

 linked most closely with intelligence, the more intelligent ani- 

 mals having relatively longer youth. And as we pass down- 

 wards from intelligence to instinct we find that the duration of 

 youth shortens." 20 



Helplessness in young animals has been very generally identi- 

 fied with the immaturity of neuro-muscular co-ordinations con- 



w Mitchell, The Childhood of Animals, p. 54. 



