Chap. XXIV. EFFECTS OF USE AND DISUSE. 301 



Our domesticated quadrupeds are all descended, as far as is 

 known, from species having erect ears; yet few kinds can be 

 named, of which at least one race has not drooping ears. Cats 

 in China, horses in parts of Eussia, sheep in Italy and elsewhere, 

 the guinea-pig in Germany, goats and cattle in India, rabbits, 

 pigs, and dogs in all long-civilised countries, have dependent 

 ears. With wild animals, which constantly use their ears 

 like funnels to catch every passing sound, and especially to 

 ascertain the direction whence it comes, there is not, as Mr. 

 Blyth has remarked, any species with drooping ears except 

 the elephant. Hence the incapacity to erect the ears is cer- 

 tainly in some manner the result of domestication ; and this 

 incapacity has been attributed by various authors 29 to disuse, for 

 animals protected by man are not compelled habitually to' use 

 their ears. Col. Hamilton Smith 30 states that in ancient effigies 

 of the dog, « with the exception of one Egyptian instance, 

 " no sculpture of the earlier Grecian era produces representations 

 ;c of hounds with completely drooping ears ; those with them half 

 " pendulous are missing in the most ancient; and this character 

 " increases, by degrees, in the works of the Eoman period." 

 Godron also has remarked that " the pigs of the ancient Egyptians 

 " had not their ears enlarged and pendent." 31 But it is remark- 

 able that the drooping of the ears, though probably the effect 

 of disuse, is not accompanied by any decrease in size ; on the 

 contrary, when we remember that animals so different as fancy 

 rabbits, certain Indian breeds of the goat, our petted spaniels, 

 bloodhounds, and other dogs, have enormously elongated ears' 

 it would appear as if disuse actually caused an increase in length 

 With rabbits, the drooping of the much elongated ears lias 

 affected even the structure of the skull. 



The tail of no wild animal, as remarked to me by Mr Blyth 

 is curled; whereas pigs and some races of doo- s have their 

 tails much curled. This deformity, therefore, appears to be the 

 result of domestication, but whether in any way connected with 

 the lessened use of the tail is doubtful. 



« Livingstone quoted by Youatt on ao , Naturalist Lib , D 



Sheep, p. 142. Hodgson, in 'Journal 1840 p 104 > v ^- "-, 



i^t Siati , C nn S fi 0( ; i BengaV V0L XVi ' 31 ' De rEs ^ ce '' tom - *•» 18 ™> P- 



1847, p. 1006, &c. &c. 367 * * *• 



