RACE IMPROVEMENT
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We hear constantly of prodigies of dogs, whose very intelligence makes them of little ' value as slaves. When they are wanted, they are apt to be absent on their own errands. They are too critical of their master's conduct. For instance, an intelligent dog shows marked contempt for an unsuccessful sportsman. He will follow nobody along a road that leads to a well-known tedious errand. He does not readily forgive a man who wounds his self-esteem. He is often a dexterous thief and a sad hypocrite. For these reasons an over-intelligent dog is not an object of particular desire, and therefore I suppose no one has ever thought of encouraging a breed of wise dogs. But it would be a most interesting occupation for a country philosopher to pick up the cleverest dogs he could hear of, and mate them together, generation after generation-breeding purely for intellectual power, and disregarding shape, size, and every other quality."
The phrase " regardless of every other quality " is too strong, some regard should be paid to the physique and to the character of the dogs.
Perhaps twenty females, ten males, and a fluctuating population of puppies would be enough for an -experiment. The cost of this would not be very great, and would be sensibly diminished in time by money derived from the sale of pups.
The idea of the improvement of the human race was again mooted in 1884, and the term Eugenics was then first applied to it in my Human Faculty. Afterwards it was strongly emphasised in my " Huxley Lecture " before the Anthropological Institute in 1 9o z [I6I], on the " Possible Improvement of the Human
