Morning journal and courier., 1889-03-11
He had learned to make sounds,

l thirteen. He had learned to make sounds, 1 but speak he could not; he freely expressed
 his anger and joy; he would work at times | little, but he liked eating (raw meat) better. 1 Mir. Ball paid visit to the Orphanage l where the latter boy was shown him by the Superintendent. He presented, says MT. l Ball, an appearance not uncommonly seen in I ordinary idiots. His forhead was low. his teeth somewhat prominent, and his manner l restless and 6dgety. From time to time he 1 grinned in an apish manner, accompanied by 1 a nervous twitching of the lower jaw After \ taking sort of survey of the room and the people in 1t, he squatted on the ground, and constantly placing the palms of his hands on the floor, stretched forward in different l directions, picking up small objects paper, crumbs, etc.-and smelling them as 1 monkey would do. On being shown a gu- 1 ava he seemed much excited, writhing about and stretching his hands for it. which, when given to him, he smelled all over very care fully, and then, holding it close to his mouth, proceeded to gnaw it. He was de- scribed being of happy temperament, had got some knowledge of locality, and could go about the ground by himself but without constant supervision it was found to be impossible to keep him to any work. The great peculiarity in his physical struct- ure was the shortness of his arms, the total length being only nineteen and a half inches MT. Erhardt, not having been in charge of the Orphanage when this boy was brought in, could give no further particulars about him; but native guide in Agra told Mir. Ball that when the boy was first brought in, aboRt riRe years ago, along with the 5ody of female wolf and two cubs, he was per feet wild beast. He went on sllfours (which probably accounted for his short arms), refused all kinds of cooked food, but
 would eat any amount of raw meat. The
 boy was .graduelly trained to walk on his
 legs only, and when MT. Ball visited him,
 his civilization had progressed so far that he
 liked raw meat less, though he still would
 pick up bones and sharpen his teeth on
 them.
 Col Sieeman, in his Journey Through the Kigdom of Oudh,' relates several stories of these wolf-reared children, most of which he
 believed to be perfectly true, though he
 could not vouch for them. In two of the
 instances, the Colonel had both seen the
 children and was acquainted with circum- stances of the capture He describes one of
 these captures thus: "Sometime ago two
 of the King of Oudh's rowars, riding along
 the banks Of the Gomtee, saw three animals
 come down to drink. Two were evidently
 young wolves, but the third was as evidently
 some other animal. The sowars rushed in
 upon them and captured all three, and to
 their great surprise found that one was
 small naked boy. He was on all-fours like
 his companions, had callosities on his knees and elbows, evidently caused by the atti- tude used in moving about, and bit and scratched violently in resisting the capture. The boy was brought up in Lucknow, where he lived some time, and may, for aught
 know, be living still. He was quite unable
 to articulate words, but he had dog like
 intellect, Max Muller quoted, few years
 ago, in the pages of the Academy, Q select-
 ion from the recorded cases of wolf-reared
 children, wbich appeared to him to be best
 sttested, pointing out particularly the
 speechlessness of all the boys brought up by
 wolves. A curious point common to all
 these stories is that all the children appear
 to have been of the same sex-namely, boys.
 There IS no record, as far as the present
 knowledge Of the matter stands, of 8 wolf
 reared girl. Now the same questions arise
 with which we started this paper. Are
 these stories of wolf-reared children true sf-
 ter all! Is It possible that wild beasts like
 wolves should spare childrena Of course, it
 is perfectly useless giving any reply to these to people who have made up their minds that the whole thing is a myth. Enough has been said and written in ridicule of the sub- ject "Not very long ago." says MT. V. Ball of the Geological Survey of India in his Jungle Life in Indis," "I asked an eminent and well-known surgeon who formerly re- sided in Oudh what he thought of these stor- ies, and his reply was, I don't believe one of them.'" It is to be feared that not few of our readers will make the same reply. Nevertheless, above are related few we'll authenticated stories of wolf-reared children, attested by both Europeans and natives of India, and believed to be true by many of them