104 NATURAL HISTORY IN ANECDOTE, 



Dogs' That dogs sometimes make mistakes in the 



Mistakes, exercise of their intelligence, with somewhat lu- 

 dicrous results, is of course true. A dog once accompanied 

 a gentleman's servant to a tailor's with a coat of his master's 

 which needed repair. Having his suspicions with regard to 

 the transaction, the dog watched his opportunity, seized the 

 coat from the counter and carried it back with evident satis- 

 faction to his master. Another dog caused great amusement 

 at a swimming match by insisting upon the rescue of one of the 

 competitors. Dogs have also been known to cause both 

 amusement and consternation by leaping upon the stage to 

 rescue the defenceless characters of the melodrama from the 

 hands of the heavy villain of the play. The story of the dog who 

 failed to recognise his master who had been bathing, and who 

 therefore refused to allow him to have his clothes, is pro- 

 bably apochryphal, but if true is another illustration of the 

 awkwardness of dogs' mistakes. 

 The Eskimo Colonel Hamilton Smith in his classification of 



•^°s- dogs begins with those which belong nearest to 

 the arctic circle, and it will be convenient to follow his order 

 in so far as space will allow. Speaking of the Eskimo 

 dog Captain Lyon says : — " Having myself possessed during 

 our hard winter a team of eleven fine dogs, I was enabled 

 to become better acquainted with their good quahties than 

 could possibly have been the case by the casual visits of the 

 Esquimaux to the ships. The form of the Esquimaux dog 

 is very similar to that of our shepherd's dog in England, but 

 it is more muscular and broad-chested, owing to the constant 

 and severe work to which he is brought up. His ears are 

 pointed, and the aspect of the head is somewhat savage. 

 In size a fine dog about the height of the Newfoundland 

 breed, but broad like a mastifi" in every part except the nose. 

 The hair of the coat is in summer, as well as in winter, very 

 long, but during the cold season a soft, downy under-covering 

 is found, which does not appear in warm we9,ther. Young 



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