266 THE BOOK OF A NATURALIST 



excepting that of the sexes; while others are 

 gregarious or social, and able to form attach- 

 ments not only among themselves, but also with 

 those of other species, and, when domesticated, 

 with man. There is a third matter, which is doubt- 

 less the most important of all, to be considered 

 when weighing the comparative advantages of 

 different kinds, namely, the habits, or instincts, 

 which change so slowly that they are practically 

 immutable, even in altered conditions, and which, 

 in the domesticated or pet animal, according to 

 their character, may prove a source of pleasure and 

 profit to man, or, on the contrary, a perpetual 

 annoyance and trouble. When our progenitors far 

 back in time tamed the animals we now possess, it 

 cannot be supposed that they expended much 

 thought on such considerations as these: probably 

 chance determined everything for them, and they 

 took and tamed the animals which came first to 

 hand, or which promised to be most useful to them, 

 either as food or in assisting them to procure food. 

 If they were barbarians they would think little of 

 beauty, little of the small differences in intelligence, 

 and of the much greater differences in disposition, 

 and, naturally, nothing at all about certain instincts 

 in some animals which would become increasingly 

 repugnant to man in a civilised state. 



We have the dog so constantly with us; the 

 grand result of centuries of artificial selection and 

 training is so patent to every one, that we have 

 actually come to look on this animal as by nature 



