IMKODUCTIOX. XXXI 



the purpose of this Monograph, the reader is referred to the various 

 publications, the titles of which he will find given in the Bibliography 

 and in the notices of the various species herein described. 



PaL.EONTOLOGY and AFflNITIES OF THE CaNID^. 



The Dog lias been a domestic animal from time immemorial. Re- 

 mains in Denmark and Switzerland prove that such was the case in the 

 Neolithic and Bronze periods, as also that one kind of domestic Dog 

 was succeeded at a later period by a larger one of a distinct breed. 

 Moreover, in very ancient times, as also in the Pacific Islands and else- 

 where recently, the Dog was used for human food. But a yet greater 

 antiquity for this sjiecics as a companion of man seems implied by the 

 fact that the remains of the Dingo have been obtained* from Pleisto- 

 cene deposits, which have also yielded us the relics of various extinct 

 animals. Of course it is probable that the animal may have found its 

 way to Australia in some way independent of man, but it seems impos- 

 sible to imagine such, while if it did owe its introduction to human 

 agency, such a fact is enough to prove that even when its fossil contem- 

 poraries existed, man was in a relatively advanced social and intellectual 

 condition. 



Remains of other Cunidce have been found in caverns of the Quater- 

 nary period and in strata of Pleistocene times, and relics of the Common 

 Fox (C vulpes) have been found in tlie Upper Pliocene f. The African 

 genus Li/caon seems then to have existed in Glamorganshire ; and still 

 surviving species of the genus Canis, as well as the yet living species 

 Ictici/on veiialicus, existed in Brazil. The genus Ci/on has been found 

 in Pleistocene deposits in a cavern in Europe. 



For the latest account known to us of fossil CanidcB, the reader is 

 referred to the labours of Max Schlosser, Woldrich, Lydekker, Filhol, 

 and Cope, as also to the well-known works of Cuvier, De Blainville, 

 Gervais, Gaudry, Lund, Leidy, and others J. 



* See below, our description of the Dingo. 



t In the Suffolk Crag. See Lydekker, Geological Mag. decade iii. vol. ii. p. 4i3 

 0884). 



X Sec below, the rala;outological section of our Bibliography. 



