PSYCHICAL EVOLUTION 121 



Bold and confident on his own premises, the dog 

 immediately becomes weak and apologetic when 

 placed in circumstances in which he feels he has 

 no rights. 



The pointers and setters have been developed 

 as distinct breeds by human selection during the 

 past 150 or 200 years. 



What is true of the dog is true also, to a large 

 extent, of the cat, cow, horse, sheep, goat, fowl, 

 and other domestic animals. Serene and peaceful 

 puss is the tranquillised descendant of the wild 

 cat of Egypt, one of the most untamable of all 

 animals. The migratory instinct, so strong in 

 wild water-fowl, is almost absent from our geese 

 and ducks, as is the fighting propensity (prominent 

 in the Indian jungle-bird) from most varieties of 

 the domesticated chicken. There are now as 

 many as a hundred different kinds of domesticated 

 animals, and there is scarcely one of these animals 

 that has not been profoundly changed in character 

 during the period of its domestication. There are 

 much greater changes in some races than in others. 

 Some races have been much longer in captivity 

 than others. And then, too, there is great differ- 

 ence in the degree of plasticity in different races, 

 the races of ancient origin being much more fixed 

 in their psychology than those of more recent 

 beginnings. In some races, too — as in the sheep 

 — the selections made by man have been made 

 primarily with reference to certain physical 

 qualities, and in these cases the mental qualities 

 have been only incidentally affected. In Poly- 



