NATURAL HISTORY OF THE DOG. 17 



that animal. We have here, then, a considerable approxima- 

 tion to a well-known wild animal of the same genus, in races 

 which, though doubtless descended from domesticated an- 

 cestors, have gradually assumed the wild condition ; and it is 

 worthy of especial remark, that the anatomy of the wolf, and 

 its osteology in particular, does not differ from that of dogs in 

 general, more than the different kinds of dogs do from each 

 other. The cranium is absolutely similar, and so are all, or 

 nearly all, the other essential parts ; and to strengthen still 

 further the probability of their identity, the dog and wolf will 

 readily breed together, and their progeny is fertile. The 

 obliquity of the position of the eyes in the wolf is one of the 

 characters in which it differs from the dog ; and although it . 

 is very desirable not to rest too much upon the effects of habit 

 or structure, it is not, perhaps, straining the point, to attribute 

 the forward direction of the eyes in the dog to the constant 

 habit, for many succeeding generations, of looking forward to 

 its master, and obeying his voice." In my opinion this mode 

 of accounting for the direction of the eye is, to say the least, 

 rather imaginative than philosophical.* But to continue. 



" Another criterion," says Mr. Bell, " and a sound one, is 

 the identity of gestation. Sixty-three days form the period 

 during which the bitch goes with young ; precisely the same 

 elapses before the wolf gives birth to her offspring. Upon 

 Buffon's instance of seventy-three days or rather the possibil- 

 ity of such a duration in the gestation of a particular she- wolf 

 we do not lay much stress, when opposed to the strong evi- 

 dence of the usual period being sixty-three days. The young 

 of both wolf and dog are born blind ; and at the same, or about 

 the same time, viz., about the expiration of the tenth or twelfth 

 day, they begin to see. Hunter's important experiments 

 proved, without doubt, that the wolf and the jackal would 

 breed with the dog ; but he had not sufficient data for coming 

 to the conclusion that all three were identical as species. In 

 the course of these experiments, he ascertained that the jackal 

 went fifty-nine days with young, while tne wolf went six- 

 ty-three ; nor does he record that the progeny and the dog 

 would breed together ; and he knew too well the value of the 

 argument to be drawn from a fertile progeny, not to have 

 dwelt upon the fact if he had proved it not to have mention- 

 ed it at least, even if he had heard of it." 



* It is too like an adaptation of Lord Monboddo's Theory, viz. thai 

 mankind had originally toils, and wore them away by conttant fitting. 



2* 



