HOBBLEDEHOYS. 103 



time, poor froggy would stand little chance of ever being 

 born ; so the egg hatches out as a tadpole. This creature 

 is what zoologists term a larva. A larva is a device of 

 Nature, whereby she is enabled to make an embryo take 

 care of itself. The tadpole is nothing but an embryo, 

 which has learned to look after itself a precocious baby 

 prepared to defy the world. 



It is thus clear that whenever an animal has to shift for 

 itself before it has had time to attain the adult form it must 

 pass through the hobbledehoy stage. The young of herb- 

 ivorous animals form an interesting case in point. What- 

 ever people may say of the prettiness of lambs, these crea- 

 tures are in reality far from being beautiful, being sadly 

 out of proportion ; and the same applies to foals, goats, 

 calves, etc. All these young animals have one marked 

 peculiarity : their legs are too large to be in proportion with 

 the rest of the body. These animals are, so to speak, all 

 legs. Contrast the young tiger or the kitten. These latter 

 are small editions of their parents, and are born with limbs 

 proportionate to the rest of the body. The explanation of 

 this difference is simple. Herbivora are timid, defenceless 

 creatures ; fleetness is their one safeguard. In this respect 

 a female with young is heavily handicapped. Her speed 

 cannot fail to be checked by the extra weight she carries. 

 It is therefore most important to the welfare of the species 

 that the young be born as early as possible ; but if they 

 were born like kittens unable to walk, so that the mother 

 had to carry them in her mouth when she desired to move 

 them, both she and they would quickly fall victims to some 

 beast of prey. It is therefore essential, not only that the 

 young of herbivora should be born early, but that they 

 should be able to run from the moment of birth. Hence 

 the seemingly absurdly large legs and the hobbledehoyish 

 appearance of the young animals. The speed at which 

 young calves can run is astounding. In India one has 

 ample opportunities of testing this. In every mofussil 

 town it is almost impossible to go for a ride in the evening 



