ORDER CARNASSIER. 319 



its savage air, its pricked ears, its rough, long, and thick 

 hair, and, from the single influence of climate and food 

 alone, will become either a French Matin, an English Mastiff, 

 or a Hound. The last, whether Staghound, Foxhound, 

 or Beagle, transported into Spain or Barbary, where the 

 hair of quadrupeds in general becomes soft and long, will be 

 converted into the Land-Spaniel and the Water-Spaniel, and 

 these of different sizes. The gray Matin-Hound, trans- 

 ported into the north, becomes the great Danish Dog ; and 

 this, sent into the south, becomes the Greyhound of different 

 sizes. The same, transported into Ireland, the Ukraine, 

 Tartary, Epirus, and Albania, becomes the great wild Dog, 

 known generally by the name of the Irish Wolf Dog. If 

 these premises be corrects, it follows, that these varieties of 

 the Dog are not of original creation, but result from cli- 

 mate, or other unknown causes, acting on the first species. 



In pursuing this observation in regard to animals which 

 appear still more foreign from each other, we find that the 

 common Dog breeds together with the Wolf and the Fox; 

 and, although zoologists and comparative anatomists have 

 ascertained, that there is a certain similarity of physical struc- 

 ture in all these animals, whence they have classed them 

 in one genus, yet the Wolf, the Fox, and the Dog, are very 

 distinct animals when not viewed scientifically. One or two 

 species of the Cats and the genus of the Hysenas, are nearly 

 as much like Dogs as Cats, or, in other words, are really 

 very like both these genera ; and yet an animal is found in 

 the Canis Venatica of Burchel, connecting the Dog with 

 the Hyaena almost without an interval ; certain species of 

 the Cats approach nearly if not completely to the Weasels ; 

 certain Weasels again to the Seals and Bears ; and these 

 last to the herbivorous and granivorous races. 



With facts like these constantly occurring, and they are 

 almost endless in zoology, there is great room for wonder that 

 the genera and species have been kept so distinct as we 



