DOGS, Wild. Zoologically the term "dog° refers to the family Canidee (q.v.) which in cludes many prehistoric genera, fossil since the Miocene, and modern wolves, dogs, foxes, fen necs, jackals, South American fox-dogs and a few others. All these belong to the typical genus Canis i but the family also contains a series of athoold° species of more dog-like aspect than Canis. They comprise the queer little raccoon dog of China; the long-bodied, short-legged bush-dog of Guiana; the fennec-like Cape fox of South Africa; the powerful and fierce hunt ing-dog of central Africa, and a group of species native to eastern Asia. These Asiatic species form the genus Cyon, are peculiar in structure, especially as to dentition. One species is Sibe rian, closely resembles an Eskimo sledge-dog, ex cept that its bushy tail does not curl; and with its compact, robust body and short muzzle it has a very dog-like aspect. It lives in forests and hunts in packs. At the other extreme is the wild dog of the Malay Archipelago, which is thinly haired and gaunt. More widely known than either of these, however, is the wild dog of India, called "buansuah° in the North and "dhole° in the South. Like the others it is nor mally rust-red in color, and makes its lair in rocky jungles. It is shy of mankind, and does not often attack cattle, but a pack will make even a tiger or a leopard turn tail.
None of these unwolflike animals called (dogs( belongs in the ancestry of our domestic races as is shown by the teeth. All kinds of our dogs have three molars on a side in each jaw, as in the genus Canis, whereas the dhole and other species of the genus Cyon have but two; and it is a rule in morphology that a character once lost may not be regained. Examination of the skull and other parts shows that all our domestic dogs must be derived from members of the genus Canis. Dogs have been found associated with natives of all parts of the world except the South Sea Islands, at their first dis covery by Europeans, and sometimes in consid erable variety. These, in all cases, were local
wolves or jackals that had been tamed and more or less modified. The sledge-dogs of the Eski mos and Siberians were only subjugated wolves ; those of our western Indians tamed coyotes; those of South Africa modified jackals; the (pariah( curs of the East came from the small red wolf of southeastern Asia; and so on, until intercommunication of tribes or of civilized with savage men, caused mixture of dog-races, and examples might be multiplied. In all these there is probably no admixture of fox blood, for the so-called "fox-dogs° of South America, which were captured and domesticated by the Indians there, are wolves, properly speaking.
Foxes do not interbreed with wolves, jackals, or domestic dogs; whereas all these readily inter breed with each other, under captive conditions. Hence there has occurred from the beginning a mingling of various captive stocks, so that the domestic dog as we know him now is a com posite that is quite inexplicable. One other ele ment, however, entered into this cakulation, and that is the probability that the modern dog may carry some inheritance from one or more extinct species to which it may owe its distinc tively doggish aspect (short muzzle, etc.). We know that men of the Stone Age had dogs about their camps, notably among the Neolithic Swiss Lake dwellers. Riitimeyer, one of the best authorities, considers -that their semifossil re mains show such specific distinctions as to indi cate derivation from neither wolf nor jackal, but from a distinct canine animal now extinct. This is by no means unlikely. Consult Mivart, 'Monograph of the Canidze' (London 1870) ; Huxley, 'Cranial and Dental Characters of the Canidte (London 1880) ; Lydekker, 'Mostly Mammals> (New York 1903) ; Ingersoll, 'Life of Mammals' (New York 1907); and books on dogs and dog-culture.