Page 27 - THE SLOUGHI REVIEW Special Edition 5

T H E S L O U G H I R E V I E W 2 7

At that time, the old Caїd, now deceased, owned a Sloughia of great beauty which he
preferred to all the other animals in his pack for the elegance of her lines, the splendor of
her gait and her sure grip. One day, he noticed that the female dog was pregnant without
him having given any order to breed her. He immediately summoned his crew chief to ask
him for explanations about this unexpected coupling with an unknown stud. The other
could only respond with an embarrassed “ma naarf” (I don’t know). The Caїd immediately
ordered the bitch to be brought to him, and without a word, he killed her with his own

hand with a revolver shot. In his eyes, and according to tradition, the female dog had to
die because she was soiled and forever impregnated by impure fertilization.

In terms of character, there is an erroneous and unfair legend around the world which
represents sighthounds, and consequently Sloughis, as unintelligent, insensitive and

unsociable dogs. This legend, like so many others, is based on a lack of sound observation,
a lack of understanding, and a simplistic and false interpretation of superficial
appearances. In a word it is based on ignorance.

The Sloughi is a proud, but infinitely sensitive dog, who knows the price of dedication,
attachment and loyalty. He can push his feelings to the extreme, and by this very fact,
refuses to waste them, jealously reserving them for whom he considers he should devote
them.

This dog of detached appearance, with a deep and mysterious gaze, hides an eclectic and
exclusive sensitivity of which he never crosses the limits assigned by himself. He too has
his rules and his atavistic traditions which he is careful not to violate.

This sensitivity, in the Sloughi, can rise to the spheres of the most pathetic pain. Two
moving anecdotes bear witness to this, reported by the Father R. P. de Jenlis, who was for
a long time a military chaplain in Morocco where he owned and raised many Sloughis.
They highlight the Sloughi's attachment to his master and to his peers at the same time as
they discover specific cases allowing us to measure the extent to which his extreme
impressionability can lead him.

The first relates to a Sloughia who, in Guercif, witnessing the agony of her usual
companion, fatally injured by accident, laid down next to him to warm him with her body
and catch his last breath. At that moment, when she only had a corpse near her, the dog
let out a plaintive and painful howl, then fell into a state of complete prostration, refusing
all food. She died two days later.