When this friend and servant of man dies, he does not or may not cease
to be useful; for in many countries, and to a far greater extent than is
generally imagined, his skin is useful for gloves, or leggings, or mats,
or hammercloths; and, while even the Romans occasionally fattened him
for the table, and esteemed his flesh a dainty, many thousands of people
in Asia, Africa, and America, now breed him expressly for food.

If the publication of the present work should throw some additional
light on the good qualities of this noble animal; if it should enable us
to derive more advantage from the services that he can render--to train
him more expeditiously and fully for the discharge of those services--to
protect him from the abuses to which he is exposed, and to mitigate or
remove some of the diseases which his connection with man has entailed
upon him; if any of these purposes be accomplished, we shall derive
considerable "useful knowledge" as well as pleasure from the perusal of
the present volume.

Some controversy has arisen with regard to the origin of the dog.
Professor Thomas Bell, to whom we are indebted for a truly valuable
history of the British quadrupeds, traces him to the wolf. He says, and
it is perfectly true, that the osteology of the wolf does not differ
materially from that of the dog more than that of the different kinds of
dogs differs; that the cranium is similar, and they agree in nearly all
the other essential points; that the dog and wolf will readily breed
with each other, and that their progeny, thus obtained, will again
mingle with the dog. [The relative length of the intestines is a strong
distinctive mark both as to the habits and species of animals; those of
a purely carnivorous nature are much shorter than others who resort
entirely to an herbaceous diet, or combine the two modes of sustenance
according to circumstances. The dog and wolf have the intestines of the