CHAPTER XXX.

FOSTER PARENTAGE.

THE phenomena of foster-parentage offer many interesting illustrations of the mental and moral aptitudes or qualities of the lower animals. The adoption of the young, not only of the same species, but of other species and genera of the most diverse structure and habits, is common under certain circumstances. The most common of these circumstances is the non-gratification of the imperious maternal instinct-the same cause that leads so many spinsters of certain age to console their idleness with pet dogs, cats or birds, or so many childless couples to adopt children in order to gratify their parental longings and inherit their wealth. It is, therefore, usually the female that becomes a foster-parent, and takes home to her affections, and to her board, the young of her neighbours, and failing them, or otherwise by singularity of preference, the offspring of other species or genera. There are many instances of hens hatching ducks' eggs and bringing up broods of ducklings, of geese tending ducklings, of cats nursing each other's kittens, and of a whole host of other birds hatching the eggs of the cuckoo. But much more interesting are such cases as the following:

1. Cats and bitches suckling each other's whelps (Houzeau).

2. Cats suckling or bringing up young squirrels, dogpups, chickens, rats, and leverets or young hares-all their natural prey or enemies (White).

3. Bitches suckling young pigs, kittens, or panther-cubs (Jesse and Jardine).

4. Hens rearing kittens, of which an instance has been

given me by a relative, or other birds sitting on dogpups.

And still more remarkable is the occasional suckling of individuals of more than one species at the same time by the same mother, as in the case of a cat that tried to suckle chickens along with her own kittens.

The most common cause or motive that leads to the adoption of the young of other animals is the loss of a mother's own young, and the felt necessity of gratifying her bereaved maternal instinct. So strong, so urgent, so irresistible even, is this necessity, that it leads occasionally to the abduction, or theft, of the young of other animals. No doubt the result is usually beneficent, so far as concerns the upbringing of the abducted young, seeing that the self-constituted foster-mother lavishes on them all the care she would have bestowed on her own. Nevertheless, there is a selfish disregard of the feelings of the other and true mother, who is bereaved by such an abduction.

Sterility-the want of offspring-operates in the same way as bereavement or loss of young. The female of mature age, whose longings for progeny have not been gratified in the natural way, takes the only means that remain to her of so far satisfying her paramount desire to have some of her own species on whom to lavish her overflowing affection.

This sort of what may be called vicarious maternity, this assumption of the duties of a mother, is not always confined to the female. There are occasional exceptional cases in which the male takes a female's place in the hatching and up-bringing of young, whether its own or those of other species or genera. Thus we are told of a male turkey hatching duck's eggs.

Generally speaking, the adoption of foster-young is voluntary; the foster-mother is self-elected. But in some cases the bringing up of the young of other species or genera is involuntary or non-voluntary; or at least there is no spontaneous selection, either of the maternal office, or of the objects of affection; for instance, where young are deserted, orphaned and cast upon the care of sometimes an unwitting

foster-mother, as by the cuckoo-or where orphaned, lost or deserted young seek the good offices of some other mother than their own.

There are several other circumstances under which fostermothers act as such unwittingly, ignorantly, exhibiting therein grave errors of the maternal instinct. Thus certain birds sit on 'dummies,' on stones or other inanimate objects, on the eggs or even the young of other species-all substituted experimentally by man for their own eggs or young, without their ever detecting the deception. Not uniformly, however, do they betray such ignorance and error. Romanes mentions a Spanish hen that, disappointed in the gratification of her maternal instincts by being placed upon dummies,' after losing patience at the absence of the expected result, 'turned foster-mother to all the Spanish chickens in the yard,' of all ages, but only to those, be it observed in this case, of her own breed-Brahma and Hamburg chickens not being adopted with the others.

In the case of a cat recently confined, two young squirrels were artificially substituted for two kittens that were killed : the cat did not notice her loss-that is to say, at first. For sooner or later in such cases the development of the natural instincts of the foster-young-climbing trees and eating nuts in the case of young squirrels-taking to the water in the case of ducklings, gives rise to unbounded astonishment and alarm in the foster-mother. When a hen sees the ducklings hatched by herself taking to a horse pond, she gives no uncertain signs of her surprise, concern, dread of, or at, their -by her supposed-singular behaviour; and she feels sadly puzzled and annoyed at her inability to follow them upon their natural element. Foster-mothers, therefore, may and do undertake duties of the nature of which they are ignorant, and for the results of which they are unprepared.

The Ettrick Shepherd tells us that a mother sheep, deprived of her own young, will take to suck the lambs of another mother if clad in the skin of one of her own dead lambs. She accepts and nourishes it as her own ever after' -not detecting the imposture. But what is more curious, for some days at first, the deceived mother 'shows far more

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fondness by bleating and caressing over this one than she did formerly over the one that was really her own.'

In some cases the foster-mother devotes her whole attention to her foster-young, if the latter are of the same age and of the same species. In other cases the foster-mother has young of her own, in which case the adoption of the young of other individuals, species or genera, is usually the result of compassion and over-flowing motherly love, not of an ungratified maternal instinct. In such cases, cats and other animals make no invidious distinction of the adopted strangers; the orphaned or deserted offspring rank pari passu with her own in the affections of the foster-mother.

As a general rule, foster-parentage, the assumption of a mother's duties, the adoption of young, whether orphaned or deserted or not, developes all the finer traits of the maternal character-constancy and intensity of affection, unremitting attention, lavish generosity, touching tenderness, self-sacrificing devotion. Foster-parents sometimes die, sacrifice themselves, in the discharge of their self-imposed duties, e.g. the lark (Buffon). Low tells us of the tenderness of a bereaved bitch to her foster-young. The female elephant allows herself to be suckled by other youngsters than her own, an illustration of maternal generosity (Houzeau); and the same is done sometimes by the dog and cat.

But, on the other hand, a selfish, rigid, and jealous exclusiveness may be exhibited, as when a cow repulses the calf of another cow.

Instances of indifference or cruelty are commonest, in other animals as in man, on the part of stepmothers-and, unfortunately also of fathers at the instance of stepmothers. Thus Watson mentions the ill-feeling of a turkey stepmother to her adopted young, and the resultant merciless treatment-the father becoming indifferent or unnatural in his affection, perhaps under his second spouse's malign influA common form of a stepmother's unfair treatment of her adopted young is her selfish exclusion from her affections and attentions of all offspring not her own. It may be, Watson suggests, parental affection that leads the widower swallow to provide a stepmother for his brood; and we know

ence.

that this is usually the assigned motive, under similar circumstances, in man. But unfortunately neither in men, nor among other animals, does the experiment usually prove fortunate, so far as concerns the happiness or comfort of the first young family.

It happens, occasionally, that more than one foster-parent or mother takes a fancy to a young brood, under which circumstances quarrels for exclusive possession of the envied treasures might be expected to occur, and probably do occasionally occur. But on the other hand, and on the contrary, these competing foster-parents find it to be equally their interest and pleasure to co-operate in tending a group of young, adopted by both. Wood tells us that a widowed goose, ́ without encumbrances,' took a fancy to a brood of ducklings that had previously been adopted by a hen. A mutual arrangement was arrived at whereby the hen tended the brood on land, and the goose on water. But the hen does not seem to have been contented with this division of labour and love, and a further arrangement was entered into whereby both foster-mothers could follow their darlings on water as well as on land. The plan adopted in regard to the water was that the hen should sit on the goose's back while she swam about after and among the ducklings. This Wood expressly describes as a fact,' and not a solitary event,' for it continued to be repeated day after day, till the ducklings were old enough not to require the care of either selfappointed guardian.

Some animals such as young cuckoos-regularly stand in need of the services of foster-parents in their up-bringing; they are brought up, if at all, by mothers of some other species or genus (Baird). In their case there is a systematic babynursing by some other bird. The mother-cuckoo boards. out' its nurslings; she transfers the maternal duty of rearing her young to some willing or unwilling stranger fostermother; she shirks and escapes from what appears to be a troublesome, though natural, duty; and all this has its parallel or counterpart in the behaviour of too many ladies. of fashion in America, France and England, who devolve upon others some of the perhaps irksome duties of their own maternity.