Rhodesian Ridgeback

There is no way to stroke a Rhodesian Ridgeback except against the grain. Along its spine, from the shoulders to the hips, runs a strip of hair that grows in the opposite direction to all the rest — the ridge that gives the breed its name, which Poles shorten to “ridgeback” or “rodezjan”. Anyone who runs a hand down its back is bound to stroke it the wrong way. In Polish, as in English, rubbing someone the wrong way means annoying them. This dog loves it, and that is the first of many matters on which it disagrees with the rest of the world. From a distance the ridge looks rather like raised hackles, so the more cautious passers-by prefer to cross the street. They need not. Its hackles are not up. That is simply how its hair is done.

The ridge is an ancestor's signature. When Europeans reached southern Africa in the seventeenth century, they found the Khoikhoi people keeping dogs with a crest along the back: small, about knee-high to a man, and, as was recorded, absolutely fearless. The settlers brought their own Great Danes, Mastiffs and Greyhounds, and from crosses between the two came a dog of European size and African stamina. The ridge survived every admixture. In 1922, in Bulawayo, a standard was written for it, borrowing the template from the Dalmatian: the spots were crossed out, the ridge written in.

Lions made it famous, and here the legend needs correcting. No dog can defeat a lion, and the Ridgeback was clever enough not to try. Its art lay in something harder: circling, darting in and darting out for as long as it took the great cat to lose its composure, and all the while staying a hair's breadth beyond the reach of its paw. Day to day its duties were less cinematic. It drove baboons and wild pigs away from farms.

Anyone who for generations judged alone how many paces from a lion was close enough is not going to wait for your consent in the matter of the sofa. The Ridgeback is independent in a calm, courteous way. It barks so rarely that when it does, the whole household gets up to see what has happened. Strangers it acknowledges, and leaves it at that. It runs with the even stride of someone who has the whole day ahead, and it endures a Polish January with the dignity of a traveller who knows perfectly well that back home it is the height of summer. All that restraint vanishes in the kitchen. The worktop is at nose height and it treats it like a shelf in a self-service shop. It does not steal on impulse but methodically: it waits until you leave the room, and by the time you come back it is lying in its place again. The only thing that gives it away is the missing roast.

Francis Barnes, the man who wrote the standard for this breed, left one remark about it worth more than the whole standard: rough treatment “should never be administered to these dogs, especially when they are young. They go to pieces with handling of that kind.” A dog that could hold a lion's gaze cannot hold out against shouting. It will accept any correction if it is fair and comes from someone it trusts, and no other. That is why you do not break a Ridgeback. You win a Ridgeback round: patiently, with praise, honestly. It is the only method that works on it and, as it happens, the only one it deserves.

There is one place where it is the dog that wins you round, and that is of course the kitchen. It rests its head against your hip, looks up and waits, and it has plenty of time. Do not give in. A Ridgeback will eat anything, always, as if the dry season were starting tomorrow, and with its deep chest a large meal bolted in a hurry means not only extra kilos but also a risk of bloat, the twisting of the stomach.

In the evening it will lie down beside you in its own way: back towards you, muzzle towards the door. That is not indifference. You only turn your back on someone you trust, and on its back it carries the signature of its whole line.

Stroke it against the grain then. It does not mind. And as long as it lies there like that, not a hair on your head will be harmed.