480 bulletin: museum of comparative zoology. 



about fifty years ago" (1860). Some other name must therefore be 

 apphed to this wolf if it ever be shown to be distinct. 



The above accounts by Hernandez and by Recchi and Lynceus are 

 the basis of most of the earher references to the Mexican Hairless Dog. 

 Lesson, in 1827, however, redescribed it under the name caraibacu.s, 

 and Gmelin, earlier, 1788, had considered it the same as the Turkish 

 or Egyptian Hairless Dog, under the name Cam's f. acgnpiivs: this 

 however, is a hairless variety of another breed. 



Noics. — The former distribution of this remarkable dog is now 

 hardly tracealile with certainty except in a general way, but it was 

 kept by the Mexicans of Chihuahua and southward, as well as by 

 the natiA-es of Peru, more especially those of the lower altitudes. 

 According to Seler (1890) the INIexicans wrapped these dogs in cloths 

 at night as a protection against cold. Some were not naturally 

 hairless, but were rubbed with turpentine from early youth, causing 

 the hair to fall out. On the other hand, dogs naturally hairless were 

 raised, as at the pueblos Teotlixco and Tocilan. The Zapotec and 

 jVIaya languages have separate words for the hairless dog. The term 

 a'oloifzcuhiili is said to signify the monstrous dog. Patrick Browne 

 (1789, p. 4S.()) writing of the natural history of Jamaica, mentions the 

 Indian dog as " Canis pilis carens, minor," a creature "frequent 

 among the Jews and nctiwes'^ in that island; he describes it as "gen- 

 erally about the size of a cur-dog with a rough skin, which looks like 

 the hide of a hog." There is nothing to indicate, howe\-er, that the 

 breed was common in the West Indies. 



In Pern, Tschudi (1844, p. 249) observed this dog mainly on the 

 coast, since its lack of a hairy coat made it unable to withstand the 

 cold of the higlier altitudes of the interior except in the warm valleys, 

 and then only if carefully protected. He describes it as slaty gray 

 or reddish gray, sometimes spotted, and says it is voiceless. He is 

 probably mistaken, however, in supposing these were the dogs found 

 by ("olumbus among the Lucayans. Nearly twenty years prcA'iously, 

 Lesson had seen the Hairless Dog in numbers at Payta, Peru. 



According to Rengger (1830), a hairless dog, possibly identical with 

 the ^lexican Hairless Dog, was indigenous among the Indians of 

 Paraguay, Avho had a special word — yagua — for it. He describes it 

 as ha\ing a relatively small head, pointed snout, ears erect or only 

 their tips drooping foi'ward, rump fat, extremities fine, tail spindle- 

 shaped nnd iisuidly drooping. Some indi\iduals do not bark, but 

 howl only. 



During the last hundred years, little attention seems to ha\e been 



