92 The Carnivora. 
the contemporary of the extinct elephantine monsters, the 
rhinoceros, the hippopotamus, and such great extinct carnivora 
as the cave-bear, the glutton, and the sabre-toothed lion. 
Further back, in the Miocene gypsum of Montmartre, we 
have a vulpine form, scarcely, if at all, distinguishable from 
our familiar fox. Yet, within this interval (the feral forms 
still existing) have arisen all the strongly marked varieties— 
from the bulldog to the greyhound, from the toy terrier to 
the dachshund—seen at a modern dog show. Nowhere, ex- 
cept in the possession of man, is anything approaching them 
to be found. We search the whole globe vainly for any 
existing form of which they may have been the direct, un- 
changed descendants; and geology gives no countenance to 
the presumption that they originated in any one or more 
species, now extinct, of which our domesticated animals are 
the only remnants. Thus, we are inevitably driven to accept 
existing species of canis as the progenitors of our domes- 
ticated races, through the operation of the law of evolution; 
and there is no more need to invoke the aid of “special crea- 
tions” for the origin of so valuable an animal, than for the 
production of so singular a bird as the tumbler pigeon, of 
hornless breeds of cattle, or of the absolutely new species 
of plants derived from wild forms by systematic experiment 
within the past quarter of a century—species quite perma- 
nent, and as fertile inter se and with both parents as are the 
different stocks of the genus canis, whether wild or domesti- 
cated. 
It has been said of Mr. W. B. Tegetmeier, F.L.S.—a gentle- 
man of world-wide renown as an authority on, and breeder 
of, pigeons and gallinaceous birds—that you might chalk 
out on a blackboard the figure of a pigeon or fowl of almost 
any form, and in a few years he would produce you a living 
copy of it. There may be a little playful exaggeration in 
that, but it expresses in a fashion the influence which man 
is really capable of exerting on the species that come within 
the pale of domestication. The close companionship of the 
