[Illustration: FIG. 41. _Harrier of Bengal._]
England, France, Germany, &c. appear to have produced the hound, the harrier, and the turnspit, for these dogs almost immediately begin to degenerate on being carried into Persia, Turkey, and such warm climates. But the spaniels and water dogs are natives of Spain and Barbary, where the temperature of the air occasions the hair to be longer and finer than in any other country. The bull-dog which is improperly called the little Dane, since he has no resemblance whatever to the large Dane except in having the hair short; the Turkish dog and the Iceland dog (_fig. 42._) are but the same race, which being transported into a very cold climate has taken a strong covering, and in the warmer climates of Africa and India has lost its hair. The dog without hair known by the name of the Turkish dog (_fig. 43._) is improperly so called, since it is not in the temperate climates of Turkey that dogs lose their hair, but in Guinea, and in the hottest climates of the Indies that this change happens; and the Turkish dog is no other than the small Dane, which had been transported into some very warm climate, and having lost its hair was afterwards brought into Turkey, where, from its singularity, care has been taken to multiply the breed. The first of them that was seen in Europe, according to Aldrovandus, were taken in his time into Italy, where they could not multiply upon account of the climate being too cold for them. But as he gives not any description of these naked dogs, we cannot determine whether they were like those which are now called Turkish dogs, or whether we should compare them to the small Dane, since dogs of every breed lose their hair in very warm climates; and as already observed, their voices also. In some countries they become quite mute: in others they only lose the power of barking, and howl like wolves, or yelp like foxes; and by this alteration they seem to approach their natural state, for they change also in their form and instincts; they become ugly and invariably have their ears assume an erect and pointed form.
It is only in temperate climates that dogs preserve their ardour, courage, sagacity, and other natural talents, the whole of which they lose when taken into very warm climates. But, as if Nature never made any thing perfectly useless, in those countries where they cannot serve the purposes for which we employ them, they are in great estimation for food, and the Negroes prefer their flesh to that of any other animal. Dogs are sold in their markets at as dear a rate as mutton, venison, or game of any sort; a roasted dog being the most delicious feast among the negroes. It is possible that their fondness for the flesh of this animal may be occasioned by an alteration in its quality by the heat of their country, and that although extremely bad in our temperate climates it may receive a superior flavour by the warmth of theirs. But I rather think this appetite dependent more on the nature of man than on the change in the flesh of the dog, for the savages of Canada have the same partiality for dog's flesh as the Negroes; and even our missionaries sometimes eat of them without disgust. "Dogs," says Father P. Sabard Theodat, "serve in the room of mutton at feasts. I have been several times at these dog-feasts, and I own that at first they excited in me a degree of horror, but after tasting them twice, I found the flavour to be good, and not unlike pork."