lower animals man himself progressed from barbarism to civiliza- 

 tion, and it may safely be assumed today that the culture of a race 

 is in direct proportion to their progress in the utilization and 

 mastery of the animal world. In our brief consideration of 

 man's present attainments along this line, it will be well to 

 speak first of his mastery of domestic animals and then, of his 

 dominion over untamed animals. 



We know that the most familiar animals of the house and 

 farm were first subjected to man somewhere on the Asiatic con- 

 tinent, but their origin and the date of their subjection are, in 

 practically every case, mysteries beyond the power of the historian 

 to solve. Certain it is, however, that man early acquired the art 

 of improving the primitive stock by selective breeding, and thus 

 began to develop under his own guidance the many varieties of 

 breeds and strains that obtain today among all our domestic 

 animals. Thus the exceedingly diverse varieties of pigeons, dogs, 

 horses, cattle, etc., are the results of human design slowly and 

 deliberately worked out in accordance with natural laws. Many of 

 these varieties, such as the pouters, tumblers and fantails, among 

 pigeons, and the poodles and bull-terriers among dogs, have been 

 bred merely to suit the caprice of the fancier. In the majority 

 of cases, however, the motive of the breeder has been purely 

 economic and we of this century are literally "the heirs of all the 

 ages" in our possession of so large a group of animal species won 

 from their native state and developed to supply so perfectly so 

 many of our needs. The dog has been adapted to the requirements 

 of hunting, herding, policing, drawing burdens, and even of serv- 

 ing as the companion of man. Other animals have been bred for 

 hunting and fishing — such as the ferrets, otters, cormorants, owls 

 and falcons. Fifty years ago there were a half dozen breeds of 

 chickens in the United States. Now there are over 100. At the 

 same time the yearly number of eggs per hen has been increased 

 from seventy-five to one hundred and seventy-five, according to 

 Prof. G-. P. Eoberts, of Cornell University. The poultry breeder 

 has produced varieties excelling also in quantity and quality of 

 flesh and plumage, respectively, while he has utterly conquered 

 the migratory instinct which was so strong in the original stock of 

 our ducks, geese, and other fowls. The domestic pig weighs four 



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