360 The Natural History of Selborne 



and dwelt on the scent of a covey of partridges till she sprung them, 

 giving her tongue all the time. The dogs in South America are 

 dumb ; but these bark much in a short thick manner like foxes, and 

 have a surly, savage demeanour like their ancestors, which are not 

 domesticated, but bred up in sties, where they are fed for the table 

 with rice-meal and other farinaceous food. These dogs, having 

 been taken on board as soon as weaned, could not learn much 

 from their dam ; yet they did not relish flesh when they came to 

 England. In the islands of the Pacific ocean the dogs are bred up 

 on vegetables, and would not eat flesh when offered them by our 

 circumnavigators. 



We believe that all dogs, in a state of nature, have sharp, 

 upright, fox-like ears ; and that hanging ears, which are esteemed 

 so graceful, are the effect of choice breeding and cultivation. 

 Thus, in the " Travels of Ysbrandt Ides from Muscovy to China," 

 the dogs which draw the Tartars on snow-sledges, near the 

 river Oby, are engraved with prick-ears, like those from Canton. 

 The Kamschatdales also train the same sort of sharp-eared, peak- 

 nosed dogs to draw their sledges ; as may be seen in an elegant 

 print engraved for Captain Cook's last voyage round the world. 



Now we are upon the subject of dogs, it may not be impertinent 

 to add, that spaniels, as all sportsmen know, though they hunt 

 partridges and pheasants as it were by instinct, and with much 

 delight and alacrity, yet will hardly touch their bones when offered 

 as food ; nor will a mongrel dog of my own, though he is remark- 

 able for finding that sort of game. But when we came to offer the 

 bones of patridges to the two Chinese dogs, they devoured them with 

 much greediness, and licked the platter clean. 



No sporting dogs will flush woodcocks till inured to the scent 

 and trained to the sport, which they then pursue with vehemence 

 and transport ; but then they will not touch their bones, but turn 

 from them with abhorrence, even when they are hungry. 



Now, that dogs should not be fond of the bones of such birds 

 as they are not disposed to hunt is no wonder ; but why they reject 

 and do not care to eat their natural game is not so easily accounted 

 for, since the end of hunting seems to be, that the chase pursued 



