ABSTRACT
The manner of inheritance for short-bent, achondroplasic legs in dogs otherwise normally formed serves very well to demonstrate the actual genetic basis for many peculiar structural reactions. Among dogs, the St. Bernard and the mastiff are splendid examples of the combination of gigantic size with acromegalic overgrowth. The basset hound originating among the dogs in western Europe and the dachshund in central Europe are the two simplest cases in dogs of localized shortening and deformity of the extremities. Any experimental analysis of the inheritance of such conditions must necessarily depend upon investigations on lower animal forms. The dogs are thus found to exhibit the three conditions well known among men of excessive growth; namely, simple gigantism, simple acromegaly, and a combination of the two. The human achondroplasic dwarf, modified in the axial as well as the limb skeleton, has a quite easily recognized behavior and disposition.
