which they evolved. They are survivals, which the centuries of human selection have not been able to iron out. In the wild life among the forests, mountains, and prairies, surrounded by enemies and pursued by wolfish wants, these instincts were useful to the individual and the species. But in the artificial conditions created by man, they are not only useless, but often even injurious.

This lesson treats chiefly of the vestigial instincts of domesticated animals. The vestigial instincts of man will be taken up in lessons four and five.

4. Wild Survivals in Dogs.

I will mention four vestigial instincts found in dogs, namely, the hunting instinct, the "sheep killing" instinct, the instinct to turn round and round before lying down, and the howling instinct. Dogs hunt, even when filled with food. Take the gentlest collie for a walk. It will not follow behind, nor walk by your side. about here and there and scouring the thickets and bank-sides to see what it can find. And if it finds something it will run it down if possible and take its life. A lamb or a calf will not do this.

It will be nosing

The dog is a made-over wolf. Its ancestors lived on rabbits, birds, sheep, and other animals, which they hunted down and slew with their teeth. But the dog eats out of a bowl. The dog hunts because its ancestors were hunters. It hunts in order to exercise an instinct which is unprovided for in its

peaceful life among men. The hunting instinct in dogs is an instinct which has gone out of use (except in dogs used for hunting) but which has not yet gone out of existence.

The collie is the dog used in herding and handling sheep. The collie has been so changed since its association with man that it ordinarily defends and loves the sheep in its charge. But once in a while this gentle being is liable to go on a spree of "sheep killing." It does not eat its victims nor drink their blood. It simply cuts the big blood vessels of the neck, and leaves its victim to bleed to death. The collie does not kill because it is hungry. It kills for exercise. It kills because the wheels of its nature have gone round in a certain way so long that it can't stop them. The impulse to kill, so strong in the wolf, has become weak in the collie from long disuse. But occasionally this old instinct mounts to the high places in the nature of this canine, and for the time being it is a wolf again.

If you will watch a dog when it starts to lie down, you will see it go thru a performance which has survived from the time when, as a wild creature, it used to make its bed among the grasses. The dog does not lie right down without any preliminaries. It turns round one or more times in the place where it is going to lie before actually lying down. Darwin says he has seen a dog turn round twenty times before finally settling down in a reclining position. Darwin thinks

that this performance is a survival of the old bedmaking process of the wolf. It is the old process of tramping down the grass to make a place to lie in. This performance was useful when the dog made its bed on the prairies, but it is a mere waste of time to a dog lying down on a rug or a floor.

Dogs bark as a general thing. But occasionally they express themselves in a strange, hair-raising howl. The "bark" is a product of domestication. Wolves howl. A wolf will get up on a hill and give out a long, loud howl, and another, miles away, will answer. They find each other in this way. And once in a while the dog will drop into this old method of signalling. I used to hear this howl years ago on the prairies of Kansas, when the coyotes called from the hills at night. Nell was our house-dog and friend. And ordinarily her voice was as soft as rippling waters. But when she heard the coyotes at night, she would stop barking sometimes and express herself in a loud, prolonged howl. It was so unearthly and so entirely different from her usual utterances that it always seemed surprising that she could ever be the author of it. It was the call of the wild. Long ago she and her associates were accustomed to megaphone to each other in this way. And her machinery, altho weathered by ages of domestication, had not forgotten the ways of the old, wild, long-vanished life.

Superstitious people sometimes account for these howlings of the dog by supposing that they

foretell death or some other calamity to the household. People who account for this instinct in this way are themselves showing a survival of the past -a survival of pre-scientific times when men everywhere interpreted things by signs and omens. A few hundred years ago there was no such thing

as chemistry or physics or science generally, such as we know today. Such a thing as natural law operating everywhere was not dreamed of. In those times men accounted for things by signs and dreams and omens. And a good deal of this old, pre-scientific way of thinking still survives in all higher peoples.

5. Wild Survivals in Cats.

The domesticated cat is from the wild cat. And, if you will watch cats about your homes, you will

see many things that go back to the old, wild life which they have left behind.

Dogs chase their prey. This is true of the whole Dog Family-wolves, foxes, and jackals, as well as domesticated dogs. The members of the Cat Family get their prey in a different way. They slip up on their prey until they are near enough, and then they leap on it. All the Cats do thislions, tigers, leopards, wild cats, and domesticated cats. The Cats hunt by stealth; the Dogs by fleetness largely.

But the domesticated cat eats out of a bowl. like the dog. Many of them never have an opportunity to catch anything oftener than once a month probably. But the instinct to catch things in the old way still survives in domesticated cats. And often you will see them making opportunities of their own to satisfy the instinct to catch something. They will creep along the ground a little distance, and then leap, as if they were catching something. Maybe it is a grasshopper. Maybe it is a fly. Maybe it is nothing. They are merely giving an old, unexercised instinct an airing.

The practice the cat has of going up to a tree or post and scratching at it for a few moments is probably an exercise which it goes thru with in order to relieve uneasiness in the muscles of its feet and toes. The wild cat climbs trees a good deal, and catches and holds things with its claws. The cat's claws are different from the dog's claws. They are retractile, that is, movable. They can be