]02 NATURAL HISTORY. 



We have mentioned above the common practice amongst the Greeks and Romans of offering Bogs 

 as sacrifices to the numerous deities. The same custom was prevalent in early times in Scandinavia, 

 where the Dog was often used as a sacrificial victim. Mr. Youatt says : " Before Christianity was 

 established among the Danes, 011 every ninth year, at the winter solstice, a monstrous sacrifice of 

 ninety-nine Dogs was effected. In Sweden the sacrifice was still worse. On each of nine successive 

 days ninety-nine Dogs were destroyed. This sacrifice of the Dog, however, gave way to one an 

 numerous and as horrible. On every ninth year ninety-nine human victims were immolated, am] 

 the sons of the reigning tyrant among the rest, in order that the life of the monarch might be pro- 

 longed. 



" On the other hand, the Dog was frequently the executioner ; and, from an early period, whether 

 in the course of war, or the mock administration of justice, thousands of poor wretches were torn to 

 pieces by animals trained to that horrible purpose. 



" As a counterpart to much of this, the ancient Hyrcanians may be mentioned, who lived near 

 the Caspian sea, and who deemed it one of the strongest expressions of respect to leave the corpse of 

 their deceased friends to be torn and devoured by Dogs. Every man was provided with a certain 

 number of these animals, as a living tomb for himself at some future period, and these Dogs were 

 remarkable for their fierceness." 



In the New World, the Dog is, or was, held as an object of adoration by many of the natives ; 

 and dog-worship seems to have been a more ancient culte than the sun-worship practised by the 

 Mexicans. Humboldt informs us that " when the Inca Pachacutec, in. his religious wars, conquered 

 the Indians of Xanxa and Huanca (the present valley of Huancayo and Juuja), and compelled them 

 by force to submit to the worship of the sun, he found that Dogs were made the objects of their adora- 

 tion, and that the priests used the skulls of these animals as wind instruments. It would also appear 

 that the flesh of this canine divinity was eaten by the believers. The veneration of Dogs in the 

 valley of the Huancaya is probably the reason why the skulls, and even whole mummies, of these 

 animals are sometimes found in the Huacas. or Peruvian gz-aves of the most ancient period. Von 

 Tschudi, the author of an admirable treatise on the Fauna Peruana, has examined these skulls, and 

 believes them to belong to a peculiar species, which he calls Canis injce, and which is different from 

 the European Dog. The Huancas are still, in derision, called ' dog-eaters ' by the inhabitants of 

 other provinces." Humboldt also tells us that "the Peruvian Dogs were made to play a singular part 

 during eclipses of the moon, being beaten as long as the darkness continued." But he says nothing 

 about the origin of so curious a custom. 



An animal of such intelligence as the Dog, one so necessary to the welfare of man, and devoted 

 to him by so many ties, is certain to have a number, of curious superstitions current regarding him. 

 An excellent account of some of the most curious of them is given by the Rev. J. Gardner. 



'' Among the Hyperborean tribes, with whom the Dog is reckoned a very valuable animal, it 

 occupies a conspicuous place in their traditions, being considered as, for instance, among the 

 Eskimo, according to the accounts given by Franklin and Parry, and other Arctic navigators as the 

 father of the human family. The Chippswayan Indians had a tradition that they were sprung from 

 a Dog ; and hence they neither ate the flesh of that animal themselves, nor could they look with any 

 other feeling than horror upon those nations who fed upon it. In all these cases, probably, the Dog 

 is the symbol of the sun, A strange notion prevails among the Greenlanders that an eclipse is caxised 

 by the sun being pui'sued by his brother the moon. Accordingly, when this phenomenon takes place, 

 the women take the Dogs by the ears, believing that, as these animals existed before man was created, 

 they must have a more certain presentiment of the future than he has ; and therefore, if they do not 

 cry when their ears are pulled, it is an infallible sign that the world is about to be destroyed. 



" The inhabitants of Japan have a superstitious regard for Dogs. Thus, we learn from Picart, 

 in his ' Religious Ceremonies of all Nations,' ' The emperor who sat on the throne when Kaempfer 

 resided in Japan was so extravagantly fond of them, that there has been a greater number of them 

 in that kingdom ever since his reign (if we may depend on the veracity of this traveller) than in any 

 other nation in the whole world. Every street is obliged to maintain a fixed and determinate number 

 of them. They are quartered upon the inhabitants, and in case of sickness they are obliged to nurse 

 and attend them. When they die, they are obliged to inter them in a decent manner in the 



