> I was born loving animals - all kinds of animals - and she was just so supportive. To give you one example: when I was four-and-a-half years old, she took me for a holiday onto a farm in the country - a proper farm, not these terrible factory farms that we have today. So I met, for the first time, cows and pigs out in the fields, and I was given a job to collect the hens’ eggs. The hens pecked around in the farmyard, but at night they slept in these little wooden hen-houses to keep them safe from foxes. My job was to go and collect the eggs. I’d go around these little hen-houses, and if there was an egg I would put it in my basket.

> But I kept asking people, “But where does the egg come out of the hen, because I can’t see a hole that big?” And nobody told me. So one day - I remember this really well - I saw a hen (she was brown) going into one of these hen-houses, and I must have thought, “Ah, she’s going to lay an egg”. So I crawled after her. Big mistake! Squawks of fear - she flew out. But now I’m on the path of discovery: I’m going to jolly well find out how this egg comes out. So I waited in an empty hen-house, and I waited for four hours. For a child of four - some of you are parents - that’s a lot of patience. My mother was about to call the police; nobody knew where I was. And then she sees this excited little girl rushing towards the house, because I had seen how a hen lays an egg and where the egg comes out. I don’t know who was more excited - me or the hen. Anyway, so she sat down to hear this wonderful story of how a hen lays an egg.

> I tell that story because isn’t that the making of a little scientist? Curiosity, asking questions, not getting the right answer, deciding to find out for yourself, making a mistake, not giving up, and learning patience - it was all there.

(From the "Speech for History".)