Uncle Dick and Lisa's Old Time Animal Tales

 

London Telegraph.

     From his eminently interesting work, entitled “Jungle Life in India,” Mr Ball has added good reasons for believing that the old classical story of the rearing of Romulus and Remus by a she-wolf may be founded in fact. The author cites the case of two lads in an orphanage in Sekundra, near Agra, who had been discovered among wolves, and in many ways shared the habits of those animals. One of his stories is supported by a letter from Prof. Max Miller. It says: “A trooper, sent by a native Governor of Chaudaur to demand payment of some revenue, was passing along the banks of the river about noon when he saw a large female wolf leave her den, followed by three whelps and a little boy. The boy went on all fours, and when the trooper tried to catch him he ran as fast as the whelps and kept up with the old one. They all entered the den, but were dug out by the people with pickaxes, and the boy was secured. He struggled hard to rush into every hole or den they came near. He became alarmed when he saw a grown-up person, but tried to fly at children and bite them. He rejected cooked meat with disgust, but delighted in raw flesh and bones, putting them under his paws like a dog. They tried to make him speak, but could get nothing from him but an angry growl or snarl.

     Another instance is quoted as having occurred at Chupra. A Hindoo father and mother went out to cut their crop in March, 1843. The woman had with her a little boy, who lately had been burned on the left knee. While the parents were at work, the child was carried off by a wolf. Some time afterwards a wolf with three small cubs was seen about ten miles from Chupra, followed by a boy. The boy, after much resistance, was caught and recognized by the burn on his knee. He could eat nothing but raw flesh, and could never be brought to speak. He used to mutter and snarl, but never articulated distinctly. The parts of his knees and the points of his elbows had become horny from going on all fours with the wolves. In November, 1854, this boy escaped again, and disappeared in the jungle. Thus the “she-wolf’s litter” of Mucalay’s “Days of Ancient Rome,” may have been, after all, no myth.