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when the safety of their helpless offspring is concerned, is indeed 
a marvel of nature. From the fragile bird to the mighty elephant, 
from the lowly snake to the highly organised chimpanzee, this 
devoted attachment of the mother for her young is seen to exist.” 
—(Chambers’ Journal. 5th series, vol. ii.. ft. j/j). 
In this respect the devotion to their young exhibited 
in the animal world may put to shame the conduct of 
some human fathers and mothers. 
“ Wisdom ! to leave his wife, to leave his babes, 
His mansion, and his titles, in a place 
From whence himself does fly? He loves us not: 
He wants the natural touch : for the poor wren, 
The most diminutive of birds, will fight, 
Her young ones in her nest, against the owl. 
All is the fear, and nothing is the love : 
As little is the wisdom, where the flight 
So runs against all reason.”—(Macbeth. Act iv., sc. 2.) 
When we consider the devotion which the animal often 
shows to its offspring, there is a tinge of irony in the 
contention that there need not necessarily be antagonism 
between a starving mother and her children. 
“ If there is only a crust of bread in the house, and mother and 
children are starving, their interests are not the same. If the 
mother eats it, the children want it ; if the children eat it, the mother 
must go hungry to her work. Yet it does not necessarily follow that 
there will be antagonism between them, that they will fight for the 
crust, and that the mother, being strongest, will get it and eat it.”— 
(Ruskin. Unto this Last. ft. 6.) 
The following illustrations of parental love are interest 
ing, not only because they display an heroic self-forget 
fulness, but also because they show how a great affection 
has power to overcome a natural timidity :— 
“The owner of a country station was sitting one evening on the 
balcony outside his house, when he was surprised to notice a 
kangaroo lingering about, alternately approaching and retiring from 
the house, as though half in doubt and fear what to do. At length 
she approached the water pails, and, taking a young one from her 
F