CANIS, the dog, in natural history, a genus of Mammalia, of the order Fem. Generic character : six upper foreteeth ; lateral ones longer, distant ; the inter mediate ones lobate ; in the lower jaw six, lateral ones lobated ; tusks solitary and incurvated ; grinders six or seven, or more than in other genera of this or der.
This genus is distinguished by its vora city, and by tearing what it devours. It is unable to climb trees ; can move with great swiftness ; has the crown of its head usually flat, with a lengthened snout; its body very considerably thicker before than behind ; its claws are long, some what curved, but not retractile. The fe male produces many at a time, and has usually four teats on the breast and six on the belly. to the savage state of the dog, his irritable and ferocious character renders him a dangerous enemy to other animals ; but, when domesticated, his grand object appears to be to please his employers, and to convert to their ser vice his courage, his swiftness, and all his striking and valuable instincts. He is extremely docile, and accommodates him self to the manners and habits of those with whom he lives, with a facility which furnishes an admirable lesson. His vigi lance over whatever is committed to his charge is connected with a courage in de fence of it, arising even to rage. His sus. p;cii ns are perpetually alive : his infe rences, with respect to the just grounds of apprehension, are astonishingly judi cious and correct, and he not only sounds the tocsin of alarm to the whole family by which he is employed as ceutinel, but (fails on a supposed culprit with a vigour and intrepidity, which generally over whelm the power of resistance. By the assistance of the dog, man has reduced the other animals to slavery. Dangerous and ferocious beasts are hunted down by its means. By conciliating, among the various animals by which he was sur rounded, those, which, at the same time that they abound in energies, are also ca. pable of affection and obedience, man has been enabled to oppose and destroy others, with which he would have able to establish no compromise, whose ferocity is untameable, and whose power is connected only with ravage and desola tion. The training of the dog was proba.
bly one of the first objects of the atten tion of man, and aided him extremely in subduing the earth to his unmolested go vernment.
The capability of instruction, and the imitative powers of the dog, have fur nished innumerable curious and interest.
ing anecdotes. A Florentine nobleman possesed a dog, which would attend his table and change his plates, and carry his wine to him with the utmost steadiness, and the most accurate attention to his master's notices.
It is related by the illustrious Leibnitz, that a Saxon peasant was in possession of a dog, of the middling size, and about three years of age, which the peasant's son, perceiving accidentally, as he ima gined, some resemblance in its sounds to those of the human voice, attempted to teach it to speak. By the perseverance of the lad, the dog acquired the power, we are told, of pronouncing about thirty words. It would, however, exercise this extraordinary faculty only with reluc tance, the words being first spoken al. ways by the preceptor, and then echoed by the pupil. The circumstance is al tested by Leibnitz, who himself heard it speak, and was communicated by him in a memoir to the Royal Academy of France.
In the theatre of Alarcellus, what many will consider more probable, but what is still extraordinary, is mentioned to have occurred, by Plutarch. A dog was here exhibited, who excelledin various dances of great complication and difficulty, and represented also the effects of disease and pain upon the frame, in all the con tortions of countenance and writhings of the body, from the first access to that paroxysm, which often immediately pre cedes dissolution : having thus apparent ly expired in agony, he would suffer him. self to be carried about motionless, as in a state of death, and, after a sufficient con tinuance of the jest, he would burst upon the spectators with an animation and sportiveness, which formed a very inter esting conclusion of this curious inter. lode, by which the animal seemed to en joy the success of his scenic efforts, and to be delighted with the admiration which was liberally and universally be stowed upon men.