THE RUSSIAN WOLFHOUND, OR BARZOI. 



BY WILLIAM WADE. 



IN beginning an article on this breed, the question of a 

 by-stander, "Why, what do you know about that 

 breed T' is most pertinent. I really do not know 

 anything about them in the sense that a writer on 

 other breeds is supposed to know of the breed he has under 

 consideration; but the consolation in this case is that, little 

 as I know, nobody else knows much more. The breed has 

 never been, in this country or in England, a regularly rec- 

 ognized one, with points and characteristics well defined 

 and authoritatively established. It may be aptly said that 

 the Russian Wolfhound, or Barzoi, is an immense Grey- 

 hound in conformation, with all the elegance of contour 

 of that grand animal, but much larger. The chief distin- 

 guishing feature of this breed is the coat, which is long, 

 fine, dense, and should be flat, although many specimens 

 have a roughness or waviness of coat suggestive of a Deer- 

 hound cross. 



That it is true that there is no definite, fixed type of the 

 breed, even in Russia, is incidentally shown by Mr. A. J. 

 Rosseau, of St. Petersburg, in the London Fancier's Gazette 

 of February 7, 1890. He says that Russian breeders have 

 been trying for seventy-five years to divide the two types, 

 the long and short haired dogs, and that, in spite of their 

 endeavors, puppies of either type will come in one litter. 

 This is simply confessing the most lamentable incapacity 

 of the Russian breeders, for English breeders have revolu- 

 tionized Pointers, Setters, Spaniels, and Terriers in much 

 less time than this, and have actually created the race of 

 Bull Terriers from the incongruous elements of the waspish 

 old English Terrier and the Bulldog. As there is every 



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