THE DOG 



39 



unhappy lost ones seeks to make friends with me. His 

 advances toward this end always begin by his dogging my 

 footsteps at a little distance. If I do not repulse him he will 

 come nearer until he has made sure of my attention. A 

 friendly word will bring him to my hand ; but his behavior 

 is never effusive, as it would be if he had found his right- 

 ful owner, but mildly propitiative and with a touch of sad- 

 ness. There is, it seems to me, no other feature in the life 

 of the dog 

 which tells 

 so much as 

 to his moral 

 nature as 

 his conduct 

 under these 

 unhappy cir- 

 cumstances. 

 In the 

 long cata- 

 logue of hu- 

 man quali- 

 ties which characterize our thoroughly domesticated dogs, we 

 must not fail to take account of their sense of property. In 

 this the creature differs from all other of our domesticated 

 animals. It is a common characteristic of mammals, both in 

 their wild and tame state, that they feel a motive of ownership 

 in the food which they have captured or in the den which 

 they have made their lair ; but beyond these narrow personal 

 limits we see no evidence of any sense of ownership in land or 

 effects. We readily observe, however, that our household dogs 

 not only know the chattels of their master and distinguish them 



Poodles 



i 



