276 THE BOOK OF A NATURALIST 
years, hhe is able to see that it was a mistake to go 
so low in the first place, to have contentedly taken 
base metal, dull-witted barbarian that he was, 
when he might just as well have taken gold. For 
the baseness of the metal shows in spite of much 
polishing to make it shine. Polishing powders 
we have, but not the powders of projection; and 
the dog, with all his new propensities, remains 
mentally a jackal, above some mammalians and 
below others; nor can he outlive ancient, obscene 
instincts which become increasingly offensive as 
civilisation raises and refines his master man. 
How did our belief in the mental superiority of 
this animal come to exist? Doubtless it came 
about through our intimacy with the dog, in the 
fields where he helped us, and in our houses where 
we made a pet of him, together with our ignorance 
of the true character of other animals. All animals 
were to us simply “brutes that perish,” and 
“natural brute beasts made to be taken and de- 
stroyed,” with no faculties at all resembling 
ours; and when it was discovered that the dog 
could be made to understand many things, and 
that he had some feelings in common with us, 
and was capable of great affection, which sometimes 
caused him to pine at his master’s loss, and in 
some instances even to die of grief; and that in 
all these things he was, or seemed to be, widely 
separated from other domestic brutes, the notion 
grew up that he was essentially different, an 
animal set apart for man’s benefit, and, finally, 
