ANIMALS. 



135 



very seldom found to prevail strongly toge- 

 gether in the same age ; one pleasure ever 

 serving to repress the other : and, if we find 

 a person of full age, placing a principal part 

 of his happiness in the nature and quantity 

 of his food, we have strong reasons to suspect, 

 that with respect to his other appetites, he 

 still retains a part of the imbecility of his 

 childhood. 



It is extraordinary, however, that infants, 

 who are thus more voracious than grown 

 persons, are nevertheless more capable of 

 sustaining hunger. We haveseveral instances, 

 in accidental cases of famine, in which the 

 child has been known to survive the parent; 

 and seen clinging to the breast of its dead 

 mother. Their little bodies also are more 

 patient of cold; and we have similar instances 

 of the mother's perishing in the snow, while 

 the infant has been found alive beside her. 

 However, if we examine the internal struc- 

 ture of infants, we shall find an obvious rea- 

 son for both these advantages. Their blood- 

 vessels are known to be much larger than in 

 adults ; and their nerves much thicker and 

 softer : thus, being furnished with a more co- 

 pious quantity of juices, both of the nervous 

 and sanguinary kinds, the infant finds a tern 

 porary sustenance in this superfluity, and 

 does not expire till both are exhausted. The 

 circulation also being larger and quicker, 

 supplies it with proportionable warmth, so 

 that it is more capable of resisting the acci- 

 dental rigours of the weather. 



The first nourishment of infants is well 

 known to be the mother's milk ; and, what 

 is remarkable, the infant has milk in its own 

 breasts, which may be squeezed out by 

 compression : this nourishment becomes less 

 grateful as the child gathers strength; and 

 perhaps, also, more unwholesome. However, 

 in cold countries, which are unfavourable to 



Sropagation, and where the female has sel- 

 om above three or four children at the most, 

 during her life, she continues to suckle the 

 child for four or five years together. In this 

 manner the mothers of Canada and Green- 

 land are often seen suckling two or three 

 children, of different ages, at a time. 



The life of infants is very precarious, till the 

 age of three or four, from which time it be- 

 comes more secure ; and when a child ar- 



rives at its seventh year, it is then considered 

 as a more certain life, as Mr. Buflbn asserts, 

 than at any other age whatever. It appears, 

 from Simson's Tables, that of a certain num- 

 ber of children born at the same time, a 

 fourth part are found dead at the end of the 

 first year; more than one third at the end of 

 the second ; and, at least, half, at the end of 

 the third : so that those who live to be above 

 three years old, are indulged a longer term 

 than half the rest of their fellow creatures. 

 Nevertheless, life, at that period, may be con- 

 sidered as mere animal existence ; and rather 

 a preparation for, than an enjoyment of those 

 satisfactions, both of mind and body, that 

 make life of real value : and hence it is more 

 natural for mankind to deplore a fellow crea- 

 ture, cut off in the bloom of life, than one 

 dying in early infancy. The one, by living 

 up to youth, and thus wading through the 

 disadvantageous parts of existence, seems to 

 have earned a short continuance of its enjoy- 

 ments ; the infant, on the contrary, has ser- 

 ved but a short apprenticeship to pain ; and, 

 when taken away, may be considered as res- 

 cued from a long continuance of misery. 



There is something very remarkable in the 

 growth of the human body." The embryo in 

 the womb continues to increase still more 

 and more, till it is born. On the other hand, 

 the child's growth is less every year till the 

 time of puberty, when it seems to start up of 

 a sudden. Thus, for instance, the embryo, 

 which is an inch long, in the first month, 

 grows but one inch and a quarter in the se- 

 cond ; it then grows one and a half in the 

 third ; two and a half in the fourth ; and in 

 this manner it keeps increasing, till, in the 

 last month of its continuance, it is actually 

 found to grow four inches ; and, in the whole, 

 about eighteen inches long. But it is other- 

 wise with the child when born : if we suppose 

 it eighteen inches at that time, it grows, in 

 the first year, six or seven inches; in the se- 

 cond year, it grows but four inches ; in the 

 third year about three ; and so on, at the 

 rate of about an inch and a half, or two inches, 

 each year, till the time of puberty, when na- 

 ture seems to make one great last effort to 

 complete her work, and unfold the whole 

 animal machine. 



Buflbn, vol. i?. p. 173. 



