The Universal Kinship means the kinship of all the inhabitants of the planet Earth. Whether they came into existence among the waters or among desert sands, in a hole in the earth, in the hollow of a tree, or in a palace; whether they build nests or empires; whether they swim, ?y, crawl, or ambulate; and whether they realise it or not, they are all related, physically, mentally, morally — this is the thesis of this book. But since man is the most gifted and in?uential of animals, and since his relationship with other animals is more important and more reluctantly recognised than any other, the chief purpose Of these pages is' to prove and interpret the kinship of the human species with the other species of animals.