32 Transactions. — Miscellaneous. 



world have not been ascertained ; but, whether they have had 

 a monogenetic or polygenetic origin, we must go outside both 

 Austraha and the great island belt to find the wild stock 

 whence the dingo has been derived, for there is no animal 

 proper to either of those regions to which its descent might 

 be traced. 



Throughout Polynesia, in New Guinea, and New Zealand 

 the domestic dog, or domestic dingo, as it might be termed, is 

 everywhere associated with the art of agriculture ; we may 

 therefore conclude that its dispersal was effected by a people 

 acquainted with that art, and it is very probable that the art 

 and the domestic animal appeared simultaneously in the 

 region. From the remains of dogs discovered in the burying- 

 places of the rude hunting tribes that formerly inhabited the 

 northern portions of Europe and Asia, it is evident that the 

 animal was brought into domestication before any portion of 

 mankind had attained to the pastoral state. -'= How the 

 domestication of the dog may have come about can be seen 

 in the taming and training of the dingo by the Australian 

 natives. As there is nothing in the arts or customs of the 

 natives that might lead us to suppose they were more civil- 

 ised than when Europeans first observed them, or that they 

 are the offshoot of a more civihzed nation, possibly they may 

 have entered the continent prior to the domestication of the 

 dog, or before it made its way into the part of the world from 

 whence they have been derived. 



Whether the Orang Poonaus of Borneo keep dogs and 

 employ thenl in the chase has not been positively ascer- 

 tained ; if they do not, as the information we possess goes 

 to show, it strengthens the supposition that the great island 

 region was peopled before the dog got into general use amongst 

 the hunter nations of the world. Throughout Polynesia the 

 dog, as an assistant in the chase, was of little use to the 

 inhabitants except to capture pigs, after those animals be- 

 came wild. In its very general dispersal wq can see at 

 what a very early period the fashion of keeping dogs regard- 

 less of utility commenced. In a few of the islands of eastern 

 Polynesia, however, this adaptive animal was turned to a 

 singular account, being fattened for food. 



The ancient pig of Polynesia, which may still be found on 

 a few of the islands, has been identified hy competent ob- 

 servers with the wild pig of New Guinea {Sus pajjuensis), 

 but whether this is really an indigenous species, or only, like 

 the dingo, a feral animal, our knowledge of the great Austral- 

 asian islands is too imperfect to justify a conclusion ; but, 

 considering the fauna of New Guinea as a whole, and the 



* " Man before Metals." Professor N. Joly. 



