480 MR. R. I. POCOCK ON THE 
than that the toes of all dogs are connected by a skinny mem- 
brane, but it does not extend to the point of the toes as in 
web-footed birds’ (Cassell’s ‘ Book of the Dog,’ p. 69, 1881). 
Since, however, the authoritative testimony of Cuvier and 
Geoffroy St. Hilaire can hardly be dismissed in the summary and 
concise manner adopted by Mr. Shaw, and since zoologists are 
sure to consult Darwin for information on a point of this kind, 
and to accept as true the uncontradicted statements of others 
contained in his volume, I think it may be useful to publish in 
our ‘ Proceedings’ figures and descriptions of the feet of some 
of our breeds of dogs, to show the actual extent of the inter- 
digital web. To ascertain this the hairs, long or short, clothing 
this web and growing between the pads in all domesticated dogs, 
have been cut away, and the figures here published are taken 
from the paws after clipping. The drawings are partially dia- 
grammatic in the sense that the digital pads are represented as 
lying in the same plane as the rest of the lower surface of the 
foot, whereas, naturally, they incline upwards in a plane of 
varying steepness, according to the breed. One or two additional 
points in which the feet have been modified by selective breeding, 
or in correlation with other features, have also been referred to. 
I was induced in the first instance to look into the question of 
the alleged palmation of the feet of Newfoundland dogs and 
of some European breeds, by finding that the feet of various wild 
species of the family belonging to several valid and nominal 
genera of so-called wolves, jackals, and foxes, only differ to a 
small degree, inter se, in the extension of the web along the edges 
of the digital pads*. The feet of some species, it is true, are 
more webbed than others in the sense that the toes are more 
widely separable, but this is attributable to the greater width of 
the integument connecting adjacent toes and permitting their 
wider separation. 
For the material examined for the purpose of this notice, I am 
indebted partly to Mr. A. J. Sewell, M.R.C.V.S., partly to 
Mr. R. E. Holding, but mainly to Mr. B. Gorton, M.R.C.V.S., 
the Society’s Veterinary Surgeon. The series comprising, I 
think, the extremes of modification met with in the dogs, with 
the exception possibly of the Dachshund, which I have been 
unable to procure, shows that the feet differ remarkably in 
length from the wrist to the digital pads, in the length of the 
digits, the width, length, and shape of the plantar pad, the width 
across from the second to the fifth toes and the length of the hair 
between the pads, and other minor features; but very little in 
the extent to which the hair spreads over the pads, and scarcely 
at all in the extension of the web along the margins of the 
digital pads. 
The web passes between the inner proximal angles of the third 
and fourth digital pads, and from the inner proximal angle of the 
* There is only one exception to this, which I shall refer to in a subsequent 
publication. 
