4 DOGS AND ALL ABOUT THEM 



the probable origin of the dog, that there are indications of 

 his domestication at such early periods by so many peoples 

 in different parts of the world. As we have seen, dogs were 

 more or less subjugated and tamed by primitive man, by the 

 Assyrians, Egyptians, Phoenicians, Greeks, and Romans, 

 as also by the ancient barbaric tribes of the western hemi- 

 sphere. The important question now arises : Had all these 

 dogs a common origin in a definite parent stock, or did they 

 spring from separate and unrelated parents ? 



Half a century ago it was believed that all the evidence 

 which could be brought to bear upon the problem pointed 

 to an independent origin of the dog. Youatt, writing in 

 1845, argued that " this power of tracing back the dog to the 

 very earliest periods of history, and the fact that he then 

 seemed to be as sagacious, as faithful, and as valuable as at 

 the present day, strongly favours the opinion that he was 

 descended from no inferior and comparatively worthless 

 animal ; and that he was not the progeny of the wolf, the 

 jackal, or the fox, but was originally created, somewhat as 

 we now find him, the associate and friend of man." 



When Youatt wrote, most people believed that the world 

 was only six thousand years old, and that species were origin- 

 ally created and absolutely unchangeable. Lyell's dis- 

 coveries in geology, however, overthrew the argument of the 

 earth's chronology and of the antiquity of man, and Darwin's 

 theory of evolution entirely transformed the accepted beliefs 

 concerning the origin of species and the supposed invariability 

 of animal types. 



The general superficial resemblance between the fox and 

 many of our dogs, might well excuse the belief in a relationship. 

 Gamekeepers are often very positive that a cross can be 

 obtained between a dog fox and a terrier bitch ; but cases 

 in which this connection is alleged must be accepted with 

 extreme caution. The late Mr. A. D. Bartlett, who was for 

 years the superintendent of the Zoological Gardens in London, 

 studied this question with minute care, and as a result of 



