If any of the lower animals bear about them the impress of the Divine
hand, it is found in the dog: many others are plainly and decidedly more
or less connected with the welfare of the human being; but this
connexion and its effects are limited to a few points, or often to one
alone. The dog, different, yet the same, in every region, seems to be
formed expressly to administer to our comforts and to our pleasure. He
displays a versatility, and yet a perfect unity of power and character,
which mark him as our destined servant, and, still more, as our
companion and friend. Other animals may be brought to a certain degree
of familiarity, and may display much affection and gratitude. There was
scarcely an animal in the menagerie of the Zoological Society that did
not acknowledge the superintendent as his friend; but it was only a
casual intercourse, and might be dissolved by a word or look. At the
hour of feeding, the brute principle reigned supreme, and the companion
of other hours would be sacrificed if he dared to interfere; but the
connexion between man and the dog, no lapse of time, no change of
circumstances, no infliction of evil can dissolve. We must, therefore,
look far beyond the wolf for the prototype of the dog.
Cuvier eloquently states that the dog exhibits the most complete and the
most useful conquest that man has made. Each individual is entirely
devoted to his master, adopts his manners, distinguishes and defends his
property, and remains attached to him even unto death; and all this
springing not from mere necessity, or from constrain, but simply from
gratitude and true friendship. The swiftness, the strength, and the
highly developed power of smelling of the dog, have made him a powerful
ally of man against the other animals; and, perhaps, these qualities in
the dog were necessary to the establishment of society. It is the only
animal that has followed the human being all over the earth.
There is occasionally a friendship existing between dogs resembling that
which is found in the human being. The author pledges himself as to the
accuracy of the following little anecdote. Two dogs, the property of a
gentleman at Shrewsbury, had been companions for many years, until one
of them died of old age. The survivor immediately began to manifest an
extraordinary degree of restless anxiety, searching for his old
associate in all his former haunts, and refusing every kind of food. He
gradually wasted away, and, at the expiration of the tenth day, he died,
the victim of an attachment that would have done honour to man.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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