1. Whimperings, body movements, tail-wags, even little yelps are all heard to emanate from sleeping canines.

2. We know that tail-wagging is purely social.

3. In only 35 generations the researchers produced tail-wagging , hand-licking, peaceful foxes.

4. This tail-wagging bias was documented in a 2007 article in the journal Current Biology by Italian neuroscientist Giorgio Vallortigara and his veterinarian colleagues at the University of Bari.

5. Barging through the gap, he hurled himself on Ethel in a frenzy of tightly curled tail-wagging.

6. It is as much a pattern of their inner being as is tail-wagging or chewing the cud.

7. Looking down on the world – and especially those tail-wagging dimwits known as dogs – may seem like the natural order of things for cats.