THE MASTIFF. 



BY WILLIAM WADE. 



writing of Mastiffs, certainly one of the very oldest 

 breeds of dogs now existing, there is a strong tempta- 

 tion to go into an inquiry as to the origin of so ancient 

 a breed; to inquire as to where it sprung from, how it was 

 developed, etc. This, however, I can not bring myself to do. 

 All theories as to the matter would be but theories every- 

 thing about the question would be misty and shadowy; and 

 where it is perfectly evident that no valid proof can be 

 produced for any of the many theories as to the origin or 

 relationship, of the breed, it seems to me most unprofitable 

 to waste our time in hazardous speculations which can profit 

 nobody. Should there be any readers of THE AMERICAN 

 BOOK OF THE DOG who delight in such abstruse and anti- 

 quarian pursuits, I would commend to them the admirable 

 monograph of the Mastiff prepared by Mr. M. B. Wynn, 

 the noted English authority on the breed, in which work 

 he has displayed a remarkable degree of patience, and 

 has devoted an amount of research to this branch of the 

 subject demonstrating, most clearly, that with him it was 

 a labor of lov-e.* 



* A few of Mr. Wynn's most pointed observations on this subject may 

 properly be quoted here. On pages 17 and 18 he says: 



" That a true Asiatic Mastiff has existed from very remote ages is proved 

 by their figures represented on Assyrian sculptures some 650 years B. C. These 

 show the broad, short, truncated muzzle of the true Mastiff, the lips being 

 deeply pendulous, and the loose skin, down the sides of the face, falling in 

 heavy folds; the ears being wholly pendent and the dewlap very pronounced 

 (which seems characteristic of the Asiatic Mastiff in its purity), the body 

 cylindrical and heavy, the limbs extremely massive, the stem mostly carried 

 upward over the back in a hoop-like curve. 



"These dogs appear to have been of vast size, equaling in proportion the 

 largest of our modern dogs, and their height may be estimated to have 



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