406 SOUTH AMEEICAN AND OTHER SHEEP DOGS. 



with other dogs, or with the children of the family. The 

 puppy, moreover, is generally castrated : so that when grown 

 up, it can scarcely have any feelings in common with the rest 

 of its kind. From this education it has no wish to leave 

 the flock, and just as another dog will defend its master, 

 man, so will these the sheep. It is amusing to observe, 

 when approaching a flock, how the dog immediately advances 

 barking-— and the sheep all close in his rear as if around the 

 oldest ram. These dogs are also easily taught to bring home 

 the flock at a certain time in the evening. Their most 

 troublesome fenlt when young is their desire of playing with 

 the sheep, for in their play, they sometimes gallop their poor 

 subjects most unmercifully. The shepherd dog- comes to 

 the house every day for some meat, and immediately it is 

 given to him he skulks away as if ashained of himself. On 

 these occasions the house dogs are very tyrannical, and the 

 least of them will attack and pursue the stranger. The minute, 

 however, the latter has reached the flock, he turns round and 

 begins to bark, and then all the house dogs take very quickly 

 to their heels. In a similar manner a whole pack of hungry 

 wild dogs will scarcely ever (and I was told by some, never,) 

 venture to attack a flock guarded even by one of these faithful 

 shepherds. The whole account appears to me a curious 

 instance of the pliability of the afllfections of the dog race ; 

 and yet, whether wild, or however educated, with a mutual 

 feeling of respect and fear for those that are fulfilling their 

 instinct of association. For we can understand on no 

 principle the wild dogs being driven away by the single one 

 with its flock, except that they consider, from some confused 

 notion, that the one thus associated gains power, as if in 

 company with its own kind. F. Cuvier has observed that all 

 animals which enter into domestication consider man as a 

 member of their society, and thus they fulflU their instinct of 

 association. In the above case the shepherd dogs rank the 

 sheep as their brethren ; and the wild dogs, though know- 

 ing that the individual sheep are not dogs, but are good to 

 eat, yet partly consent to this view, when seeing them in a 

 flock, with a shepherd dog at their head." 



Othee Laege' Races oe Sheep Dogs. — There are one 

 or two fine species in France, as those of Brie and Auvergne. 

 In- a letter from G. W. Lafayette, to John S. Skinner, Esq., 

 the latter are pronounced equal to Spanish dogs.* Large, 



* See Farmers' library, Vol. I, p. 465. 



