THE DOG 31 



but always effective selection which tended ever to develop 

 a higher grade of intelligence. With the advance in the 

 organization of society the dog is losing something of his 

 utility, even in the way of sport. He is fast becoming a 

 mere idle favorite, prized for unimportant peculiarities of 

 form. The effort in the main is not now to make creatures 

 which can help in the employments of man, but to breed for 

 show alone, demanding no more intelligence than is necessary 

 to make the animal a well-behaved denizen of a house. The 

 result is the institution of a wonderful variety in the size, 

 shape, and special peculiarities of different breeds with 

 what appears to be a concomitant loss in their intelligence. 

 We often hear it remarked by those who are familiar with 

 dogs that the ordinary mongrels are more intelligent and 

 more susceptible of high training than the carefully inbred 

 varieties, which are more highly prized because they conform 

 to some thoroughly artificial standard of form or coloring. 

 This is what we should expect from all we know concerning 

 the breeding. Where for generations the dog-fancier has 

 selected for reproduction with reference to the trifling and 

 often injurious features of shape he seeks to attain, he natur- 

 ally and almost necessarily neglects to choose the creatures 

 in regard to their mental peculiarities. The result is that 

 the breed tends to fall back in these regards to below the 

 level of the ordinary cur, who makes his place in the affec- 

 tions of his owner because he has attractive or useful quali- 

 ties of mind. It appears to me, in a word, that our treat- 

 ment of this noble animal, where he is bred for ornament, is 

 in effect degfraclingf. 



Although the formation of our fancy breeds does not 

 serve to advance the development of those intellectual feat- 



