GENERAL HISTORY 7 



so much the appearance of a large, bare-boned dog, that a 

 popular description of the one would serve for the other. 



Nor are their habits different. The wolf's natural voice 

 is a loud howl, but when confined with dogs he will learn to 

 bark. Although he is carnivorous, he will also eat vegetables, 

 and when sickly he will nibble grass. In the chase, a pack of 

 wolves will divide into parties, one following the trail of the 

 quarry, the other endeavouring to intercept its retreat, exer- 

 cising a considerable amount of strategy, a trait which is 

 exhibited by many of our sporting dogs and terriers when 

 hunting in teams. 



A further important point of resemblance between the 

 Canis lupus and the Canis familiaris lies in the fact that the 

 period of gestation in both species is sixty-three days. There 

 are from three to nine cubs in a wolf's litter, and these are 

 blind for twenty-one days. They are suckled for two months, 

 but at the end of that time they are able to eat half-digested 

 flesh disgorged for them by their dam or even their sire. 



We have seen that there is no authenticated instance of a 

 hybrid between the dog and the fox. This is not the case 

 with the dog and the wolf, or the dog and the jackal, all of 

 which can interbreed. Moreover, their offspring are fertile. 

 Pliny is the authority for the statement that the Gauls tied 

 their female dogs in the wood that they might cross with 

 wolves. The Eskimo dogs are not infrequently crossed 

 with the grey Arctic wolf, which they so much resemble, and 

 the Indians of America were accustomed to cross their half- 

 wild dogs with the coyote to impart greater boldness to the 

 breed. Tame dogs living in countries inhabited by the jackal 

 often betray the jackal strain in their litters, and there are 

 instances of men dwelling in lonely outposts of civilisation 

 being molested by wolves or jackals following upon the trail 

 of a bitch in season. 



These facts lead one to refer to the familiar circumstance 

 that the native dogs of all regions approximate closely in size, 

 coloration, form, and habit to the native wolf of those regions. 



