OF DOMESTICATED ANIMALS. 
473 
count, the changes which the molars undergo in their natural wear have been 
hitherto neglected ; but the following is the order in which they appear :— 
The temporary front molars are usually found at the time of birth, or 
they protrude through the gums in the course of two or three days. The 
first back molar of the lower jaw appears when the puppy is six weeks old, 
and the supernumerary molars at about eight weeks. The second and third 
front molars are changed when the animal is between two and three months 
old; and the second back molar appears about the same time. Between three 
and four months the first adult front molar protrudes, and the last back 
molar between five and six months ; but all these changes are, as with the 
incisors, more slowly effected in the small than in the large dog, and in 
very small dogs dentition is not completed until the eighth or ninth month.” 
We confess that we are not satisfied with this account of the 
molar teeth of the dog. They are not described as a naturalist 
would describe them ; and they are not described correctly. It 
would seem that our excellent author was much more in fear of a 
bite than either a zoologist or a veterinary surgeon should have 
been, and has painted more from imagination than from life. 
The supernumerary molars have the least of any, except the 
canines and true molars, of the fleur-de-lis form, and soonest 
of all lose it. They appear last of all the molars, and, so far as 
our experience goes, continue as long as any of them. Placed 
immediately behind the canine teeth, and not reaching one-third 
of the way down those teeth, it is comparatively seldom that they 
can be to any considerable extent employed, or that any thing can 
be brought to bear upon them which will hazard their security. 
The false molars (for so naturalists have agreed to call the 
anterior and bicuspid-molar teeth) are of a trenchant form; they 
have a cutting edge anteriorly and posteriorly ; and even more 
of the fleur-de-lis form than the incisor teeth. There is this 
difference between them—the anterior one has a simple conical 
double-cutting form, with a slight projection at the base of the 
posterior edge, and a mere rudiment of one on the anterior edge. 
The second false molar has this posterior projection developed into 
a smaller accuminated point with the rudiment of a second one; 
and the third false molar has the original large conical projection, 
with two more developed and distinct smaller ones posteriorly. 
M. Girard is wrong when he speaks of their having protruded 
before the birth, or protruding a few days afterwards. A spe¬ 
cimen is now lying before us. It is that of a beagle pup])y, in 
which the grand carnivorous and the comj)Ound trenchant and 
tuberculous tooth in the upper jaw and the carnivorous tooth in 
the lower jaw are cut, but there arc only two false molars on either 
side ])crfect, and tlic second beginning to ])ierce the gums. 
No one, we believe, has sufficiently marked tlie wear in these 
teeth as it respects the age of the dog; i)ut tlie alteration in tlieir 
