108 NATURAL HISTORZ, 



" has been found incurable in Dogs which have been brought home as puppies from countries, such as 

 Tierra del Fuego and Australia, where the savages do not keep these domestic animals. How rarely, 

 on the other hand, do our civilised Dogs, even when quite young, require to be taught not to attack 

 Poultry, Sheep, and Pigs !"* 



A most astonishing account of an inherited mental peculiarity an instinctive dislike is related 

 by Dr. Huggins, to whose researches the science of astronomy owes so much. He writes : 



" I possess an English Mastiff, by name Kepler, a son of the celebrated Turk, out of Venus. I 

 brought the Dog, when six weeks old, from the stable in which he was born. The first time I took 

 him out, he started back in alarm at the first butcher's shop he had ever seen. I soon found that he 

 had a violent antipathy to butchers and butchers' shops. When six months old, a servant took him 

 with her on an errand. At a short distance before coming to the house she had to pass a butcher's 

 shop. The Dog threw himself down (being led with a string), and neither coaxing nor threats would 

 make him pass the shop. The Dog was too heavy to be carried ; and as a crowd collected, the servant 

 had to return with the Dog more than a mile, and then go without him. This occurred about two 

 years ago. The antipathy still continues, but the Dog will pass nearer to a shop than he formerly 

 would. About two months ago, in a little book on Dogs published by Dean, I discovered that the 

 same strange antipathy was shown by his father, Turk. I then wrote to Mr. Nicholls, the former owner 

 of Turk, to ask him for any information he may have on the point. He replied ' I can say that the 

 same antipathy exists in King (the sire of Turk), in Punch (son of Turk, out of Meg), and in Paris 

 (son of Turk, out of Juno). Paris has the greatest antipathy, as he would hardly go into a street 

 where a butcher's shop was, and would run away after passing it. When a cart with a butcher's man 

 came into the place where the Dogs were kept, although they could not see him, they all were ready 

 to break their chains. A master-butcher, dressed privately, called one evening on Paris's master to 

 see the Dog. He had hardly entered the house before the Dog (though shut in) was so excited that 

 he had to be put into a shed, and the butcher was forced" to leave without seeing the Dog. The 

 same Dog, at Hastings, made a spring at a gentleman who came into the hotel. The owner 

 caught the Dog and apologised, and said he never knew him to do so before, except when a butcher 

 came to his house. The gentleman at once said that was his business. So you see that they inherit 

 these antipathies, and show a great deal of breed.' "t 



A gentleman on reading this account of Dr. Huggins's Dog, wrote to say that he possessed a son 

 of Sybil, daughter of Turk, who possessed the family antipathy in a marked degree, and another stated 

 that he also possessed a grandson of the redoubted Mastiff, in whom the same peculiarity was developed. 

 Thus we see that this most remarkable instinctive dread, arising no one knows how, existed not only 

 in Dr. Huggins's Dog, but in his father, grandfather, brothers, and nephews ! It was suggested, and it 

 seems highly probable, that the feeling in this case first arose from the fact of some ancestor of the 

 Turk family being ill-treated by a butcher ; but it is quite possible that it may have arisen sponta- 

 neously. Boswell, in his life of Johnson, quotes the " Great Lexicographer " as attributing a similar 

 dislike to butchers noticed in the Dogs of some savage countries, where the animal was used for food, 

 not to horror at the butcher's cruelty, but merely to the smell of carnage. 



A very remarkable trait in the Dog's character, which has undoubtedly become instinctive, 

 and is consequently transmitted from generation to generation, is his love of human society. A well 

 cared-for Dog will always prefer his master's company to that of his own kind, and will take any 

 amount of trouble, and give up any amount of personal ease, that he may not be parted from him. 



But, undoubtedly, the most wonderful canine instinct is the sense of direction, the power possessed 

 by so many Dogs of finding their way back to an old and well-loved home, after being forcibly removed 

 from it to a new place of abode. Instances are numerous in which Dogs, taken from their usual habi- 

 tation, shut up in a basket, or by night, or in a swift railway train, have unerringly found their way 

 back, greatly to the surprise of both their new and their old masters. Mr. Wallace has suggested 

 that this was not a true case of instinct, but that the Dog, in all probability, found his way back by 

 smell ; that he, as it were, takes a note of every smell he passes a stagnant pool here, a haystack there, 

 a wayside inn, a stable, &c. &c. and, remembering not only the smells, but the order in which he 



* Darwin's "Origin of Species." f Dr Huggins, Nature, VoL "VTL 



