Page:EB1911 - Volume 08.djvu/397

 and the coat silky and wavy. Of the water spaniels the Irish breeds are best known. They are relatively large dogs, with broad splay feet, and silky oily coats.

The poodle is probably derived from spaniels, but is of slighter, more graceful build, and is pre-eminent even among spaniels for intelligence. The best known pet spaniels are the King Charles and the Blenheim, small dogs with fine coats, probably descended from Cockers.

Setters owe their name to their having been trained originally to crouch when marking game, so as to admit of the net with which the quarry was taken being drawn over their heads. Since the general adoption of shooting in place of netting or bagging game, setters have been trained to act as pointers. They are pre-eminently dogs for sporting purposes, and special strains or breeds adapted to the peculiarities of different kinds of sporting have been produced. Great Britain is probably the country where setters were first produced, and as early as the 17th century spaniels were used in England as setting dogs. It is probable that pointer blood was introduced in the course of shaping the various breeds of setter. The English setter should have a silky coat with the hair waved but not curly; the legs and toes should be hairy, and the tail should have a bushy fringe of hairs hanging down from the dorsal border. The colour varies much, ranging according to the strains, from black-and-white through orange-and-white and liver-and-white to pure white, whilst black, white, liver, and red or yellow self-coloured setters are common. The Irish setter is red without trace of black, but occasionally flecked with white. The Gordon setter, the chief Scottish variety, is a heavier animal with coarser hair, black-and-tan in colour. The Russian setter has a woolly and matted coat.

The retriever is a large dog used for retrieving game on land, as a water spaniel is used for the same purpose in water. The breed is almost certainly derived from water-spaniels, with a strong admixture of Newfoundland blood. The colour is black or tan, and the hair of the face, body and tail is close and curly, although wavy-coated strains exist.

The Newfoundland is simply an enormous spaniel, and shows its origin by the facility with which it takes to water and the readiness with which it mates with spaniels and setters. It has developed a definite instinct to save human beings from drowning, this probably being an evolution of the retrieving instinct of the original spaniels. The true Newfoundland is a very large dog and may reach 31 in. in height at the shoulder. The coat is shaggy and oily, and is preferred with as little white as possible, but the general black coloration may have rusty shades. The eyes and ears are relatively small, and the forehead white and dome-shaped, giving the face the well-known appearance of benignity and intelligence. Although these dogs were originally brought to Great Britain from Newfoundland and are still bred in the latter country, greater size, perfection and intelligence have been attained in England, where Newfoundlands for many years have been the most popular large dogs. They are easily taught to retrieve on land or water, and their strength, intelligence and fidelity make them specially suitable as watchdogs or guardians. The Landseer Newfoundland is a black and white variety brought into notice by Sir Edwin Landseer, but the exact ancestry of which is unknown. The Labrador Newfoundland is a smaller black variety with a less massive head. It occurs both in Newfoundland and England, and has been used largely in producing crosses, being almost certainly one parent of the retriever.

The St Bernard is a large breed taking its name from the monastery of Mount St Bernard in the Alps, and remarkable for high intelligence and use in rescuing travellers from the snow. The origin of the breed is unknown, but undoubtedly it is closely related to spaniels. The St Bernard attains as great a size as that of any other breed, a fine specimen being between 60 and 70 in. from the tip of the nose to the root of the tail. The colour varies, but shades of tawny-red and white are more frequent than in Newfoundlands. In the rough-haired breed the coat is long and wavy, but there exists a smooth breed with a nearly smooth coat.

Hounds.—These are large dogs, hunting by smell, with massive structure, large drooping ears, and usually smooth coats, without fringes of hair on the ears, limbs or tail. The bloodhound is probably the stock from which all the English races of hounds have been derived. The chief character is the magnificent head, narrow and dome-like between the huge pendulous ears, and with transverse puckers on the forehead and between the eyes. The prevailing colour is tan with large black spots. Bloodhounds, or, as they are sometimes termed, sleuthhounds, have been employed since the time of the Romans in pursuing and hunting down human beings, and a small variety, known as the Cuban bloodhound, probably of Spanish origin, was used to track fugitive negroes in slaveholding times. Bloodhounds quest slowly and carefully, and when they lose the scent cast backwards until they recover the original trail and make a fresh attempt to follow it.

Staghounds are close derivatives of the bloodhound, and formerly occurred in England in two strains, known respectively as the northern and southern hounds. Both breeds were large and heavy, with pendulous ears and thick throats with dewlaps. These strains seem to be now extinct, having been replaced by foxhounds, a large variety of which is employed in stag-hunting.

The modern English foxhound has been bred from the old northern and southern hounds, and is more lightly built, having been bred for speed and endurance. The favourite and most common colour is black-white-and-tan. The ears are usually artificially clipped so as to present a rounded lower margin. Their dash and vigour in the chase is much greater than that of the bloodhound, foxhounds casting forwards when they have lost the trail.

Harriers are a smaller breed of foxhounds, distinguished by their pointed ears, as it is not the custom to trim these. They are used in the pursuit of hares, and, although they are capable of very fast runs, have less endurance than foxhounds, and follow the trail with more care and deliberation.

Otterhounds are thick, woolly harriers with oily underfur. They are savage and quarrelsome, but are naturally excellent water-dogs.

Beagles are small foxhounds with long bodies and short limbs. They have a full bell-like cry and great cunning and perseverance in the tracking of hares and rabbits. They are relatively slow, and are followed on foot.

Turnspits were a small, hound-like race of dogs with long bodies, pendulous ears, out-turned feet and generally black-and-tan coloration. They were employed as animated roasting jacks, turning round and round the wire cage in which they were confined, but with the employment of mechanical jacks their use ceased and the race appears to be extinct.

Basset hounds are long and crooked-legged dogs, with pendulous ears. They appear to have been produced in Normandy and the Vendée, where they were employed for sporting purposes, and originally were no very definite breed. In comparatively recent times they have been adopted by English fanciers, and a definite strain with special points has been produced.

The dachshund, or badger hound, is of German origin, and like the basset hound was originally an elongated distorted hound with crooked legs, employed in baiting and hunting badgers, but now greatly improved and made more definite by the arts of the breeder. The colour is generally black-and-tan or brownish, the body is extremely long and cylindrical; the ears are large and pendulous, the legs broad, thick and twisted, with everted paws. The coat is short, thick and silky, and the tail is long and tapering.

The pointers, of which there are breeds slightly differing in most European countries, are descendants of the foxhound which have been taught to follow game by general body scent, not by tracking, nose to the ground, the traces left by the feet of the quarry, and, on approaching within sight of the game, to stand rigid, “pointing” in its direction. The general shape is like that of the foxhound, but the build is lighter and better knit, and the coat is soft, whilst white and spotted colorations are preferred. Pointers are employed to mark game for guns, and are especially useful in low cover such as that afforded by turnip fields.