ose to be an equally imaginary flea; after
he has thus gained a few seconds for readjustment, he welcomes me
joyously. All this is so thoroughly human-like, that even the
naturalist, the professional doubter, is forced to believe that the
dog's mind works substantially as his own, and that the feelings
connected with the action are essentially the same.

While in the case of the elephant and the pig, and in a less measure
in several other of the lower animals, we have indices of as high or
even higher intelligence than the dog, no other brute shows anything
like the same measure of what we may term human quality. So far as the
field of the emotions is concerned, we are driven to believe that it
has been bred into the kind by the ages of intimate associations,
supported by the selective process which has led people to preserve
the individual of the species with which they found themselves the
most in sympathy. I repeat the suggestion, and shall repeat it yet
again, for the reason that just here--how effectively the reader's
imagination will suggest--we find a basis for the hope that, with
time and care, man may bring his subjects of the lower realm into a
more intimate, affectionate, and helpful relation than is dreamed of
by those who look upon them as mere brutes.

The most curious limitation which we find in dogs is as to the measure
of expression to which they have attained. No one who has well
considered the facts can doubt that our civilized varieties of this
species have something like a hundred times as much which deserves
utterance as their savage forefathers possessed. Yet the capacity for
giving note to these thoughts or emotions has not gained anything like
the proportion to the needs. It seems, however, that some gain in this
direction has been made, and that much may be won hereafter in the way
of further advance. Never having known the species whence our dogs came
in its wild state, we are uncertain as to its modes of expression; but,
observing the varieties of dogs which are kept by savages, it seems
probable that the primitive canines used their voice only in howling or
yelping; that is, as a continuous sound akin to the bellowings or other
cries of the various wild mammals. It is characteristic of all these
primitive forms of utterance that they are, to a great extent,
involuntary, and that when the outcry is begun it continues in a
mechanical manner, with no trace of modulation arising from the
condi