126 DOGS. 



and if the education of some of the races nearer to the wild 

 condition, do not appear to be advanced to a great degree of 

 tractability, we must reflect that domestic qualities are of very 

 slow growth, as long as wild congeners exist in the same coun- 

 try ; and that, where man is a savage, his dog cannot be expected 

 to be civilized. This truth is, indeed, of such universal appli- 

 cation, that in some measure we may determine the social 

 condition of a nation by the degree of education its dogs have 

 acquired."* 



Having introduced these arguments of Colonel Hamilton 

 Smith, an eminent and talented zoologist, it may prove interest- 

 ing to the reader to hear Sir John Sebright, who with considerable 

 ability attempts to account for the different habits of the several 

 breeds, though adopting at the outset the common notion that 

 they are all varieties of one species : 



" Perhaps the strongest proof that what is commonly called 

 instinct in animals is not implanted in them by nature is, that 

 very different propensities are found in the various breeds of 

 domestic dogs, and that they are always such as are particularly 

 suited to the purposes to which each of these breeds has long 

 been, and is still, applied. The performances of the shepherd's 

 dog, which would seem to be the result of little less than human 

 intelligence, are much too artificial, and too much in opposition 

 to the nature of the animal, to be attributed to instinct ; and yet 

 the young dogs of this breed appear to have a propensity to the 

 performance of these services, or, as the shepherds say, a 

 thorough-bred one will take to them naturally. I do not believe that 

 the same things could be taught to dogs of other breeds, such 

 as the hound, the greyhound, or the pointer, by the most skilful 

 training. 



" No one can suppose that nature has given to the several 

 varieties of the same species, such very different instinctive pro- 

 pensities, and that each of these breeds should possess those that 

 are best fitted for the particular uses to which it is applied. It 



* The Natural History of Dogs (Edinburgh, 1839), p. 78105. 



