THE EVOLUTION OF A MOTHER. 287 



Now it is owing to the necessity for having a cer- 

 tain number of the more useful routes established be- 

 fore the babe can be trusted from its Mother's side, 

 that the delay of Infancy is required. And even after 

 the child has begun to practise the art of living for 

 itself, time has still to be granted for many purposes 

 —for new route-making, for becoming familiar with 

 established thoroughfares, for practising upon obsta- 

 cles and gradients, for learning to perform the jour- 

 neys quickly and without fatigue, for allowing acts re- 

 peated to accelerate and embody themselves as habits. 

 In the savage-state, where the after-life is simple, the 

 adjustments are made with comparative ease and 

 speed ; but as we rise in the scale of civilization the 

 necessary period of Infancy lengthens step by step, 

 until in the case of the most highly educated man, 

 where adjustments must be made to a wide intellect- 

 ual environment, the age of tutelage extends for al- 

 most a quarter of a century. 



The use of all this to morals, the reactions espe- 

 cially upon the Mother, are too obvious to dwell 

 on. Till the brain arrived, everything was too 

 brief, too rapid for ethical achievements ; animals 

 were in a hurry to be born, children thirsted to 

 be free. There was no helplessness to pity, no 

 pain to relieve, no quiet hours, no watching; to 

 the Mother, no moment of suspense — the most 

 educative moment of all — when the spark of life in 

 her little one burned low. Parents could be no use 

 to their offspring physically, and the offspring could 

 be no use to their parents psychically. The young 

 required no Infancy; the old acquired no Sympathy. 

 Even among the other Mammalia or the Birds the 



