THE GREAT DOG-SUPERSTITION 267 



superior in mental endowment, genial qualities, and 

 general adaptiveness to all others. Yet the qualities 

 which make the dog valuable to us now formed no 

 part of its original character ; it is valuable chiefly 

 for its various instinctive tendencies, and these are 

 a later growth and purely the result of individual 

 spontaneous variations, and of man's unconscious 

 selection. The dog's affection for his master — the 

 anxiety to be constantly with and to be noticed 

 and caressed by him, the impatience at his absence 

 and grief at his loss, and the courage to defend him 

 and his house and his belongings from strangers — 

 this affection of which we are accustomed to think 

 so highly, regarding it as something unique in 

 Nature, is in reality a very small and a very low 

 thing ; and by low is here meant common in the 

 animal world, for it exists in a great many, prob- 

 ably in a large majority, of mammalian brains in 

 every order and every family. Nor is it confined 

 to mammalians. The duck does not occupy a 

 distinguished place in the scale of being, and the 

 lame duck that attached itself to Mr. Caxton, and 

 affectionately followed him up and down in his 

 walk, might seem an exceptionally gifted bird to 

 those who know little of animal life. It is of 

 course here assumed that Bulwer did not invent 

 the lame duck : a peacock or bird of paradise, 

 with all its organs complete, would have suited his 

 fancy better. Probably the incident — for such 

 incidents are very common — was told to him as 

 true, and thinking that it would give a touch of 



