CHAPTER VI. 



FEEDING, MANAGEMENT, TRAINING, ETC. 



THE natural food of the dog is flesh, and it is found 

 that those in a wild state prefer it to any other kind 

 of nutriment. It is this desire that gives to him the 

 instinctive property of pursuing other animals ; and 

 without this craving of nature he never would hunt. 

 Many have been of opinion that to feed a dog on flesh 

 destroys the acuteness of his olfactory sense. This 

 doctrine we most positively deny, and that, too, upon 

 the most common principles of physiology ; for it is 

 difficult to conceive how any animal should be formed 

 with a natural desire for a particular sort of food, the 

 use of which would prove destructive to some of his 

 faculties. 



Although, however, the dog is strictly a carnivorous 

 animal, yet he can subsist on many kinds of food ; 

 which is the case, also, with various other animals more 

 highly carnivorous in their nature. It has been said of 

 man himself, that feeding on flesh destroys his sense 

 of smell in some degree ; and in support of this state- 

 ment it is alleged, that certain natives of India who 

 feed entirely on grain, have the olfactory sense in such 

 a degree of perfection, that they can distinguish the 

 smell of the water of one spring from that of another. 

 But such accuracy of discrimination has been satisfac- 

 torily ascertained to be entirely the result of practice. 



