HUNTING DOG. This interesting animal (Largo's cactus), which inhabits all the more open parts of Africa south of the Sahara and Abyssinia, is an aberrant species of dog, distin guished from the typical Canis by having four toes on eaeli foot, and other structural peculiari ties. It is about as tall as a greyhound. its legs being ielativel• long and slender, and adapted to the swift and enduring speed upon which it must, depend for it livelihood. The head is broad and flat, with a short imizile armed with massive teeth, rather large upstanding furry ears. and a suggestion of the hyena in the physiognomy: hence it is sometime: (-tilled 'hyena-dog.' tholigh the likeness (even to the hyena) is wholly superficial. (See Pia t I. 01 WOLVF:S AND 1)( The fur is short, thick. and smooth, and grows more sliagg) about the cheeks and throat ; and the tail is long and wolf-like. In general color this I log is yellowish gray. but it is marked most irregularly with a variety of colors, such as a combination of red. white, yellow, and black so that the hyena-dog may be regarded as the most particolored of all mammalia. In the southern Sudan, where the animals are plentiful, ;sehweinfurth saw one speeimen that was per feetl• taine, required no other restraint than a cord. and yielded to its master with all the do cility of :in ordinary dog. This fact appears to corroborate the assertion of Livingstone that the natives of the 1:abilmri desert are accustomed to break in this animal and train it for the chase.
To the Africans generally. however, both white and black, the hyena dog one of the most truly wild and dangerous animals of the country, tak ing the place of the wolves of the northern part of the world. They gathered into packs. and astonished and terrified the early settlers and explorers by their numbers. audacity. and strange eries. They frequented mostly plains and scantily forested or brushy regions. where the small ante lopes abound, which were their principal prey, and which they (Mild pursue in eoncert, often only two working together, until the battled vie tint (often of the larger species) was cornered or exhausted and might be pulled down. They were a terrible scourge to the sheep and goats of the early frontier formers, and killed or mangled many inure of the flock in one of their nocturnal forays than they could possibly eat. The war waged against them in consequence, and the oiminution of the will game, has caused a great decrease in their numbers; but numerous bands still range the wilds of East and Central Africa, and the deserts west and north of Cape Colony. Consult : for early history of the animal, the books of Livingstone, ilordon-Cumming, Moffat, llarris, and their eontemporaries; and for later facts, Schweinfurth, Heart of Africa, translated (Lon don, 1873) ; Scions, A Bunter's Wanderings ( London, 1890). See Doc.