470 BRITISH DOGS 



indeed that he makes a mistake. If he stands to a hole, you may 

 be sure there is a rabbit there. He will, too, mark the exact 

 spot where a ferret is laid up with a rabbit. With a knowing 

 turn of the head, first one side, then another, to try and catch the 

 least sound, he will raise himself and pounce down on his fore 

 feet, as if to say, " Here they are ! " and after perhaps half an hour's 

 hard work with a spade, you will find that Pat has told the truth. 

 The Irish Terrier is very fond of the water, and will work a sedge- 

 bed for duck or moorhen as well as a Spaniel. 



A friend of the writer in Hampshire regularly shoots over a 

 brace of Irish Terriers, and it is a treat to see them work quarter 

 a field like a Setter, hunt hedgerow or gorse, however thick, and 

 retrieve to hand fur or feather as tenderly as a well-broken Retriever. 

 In fact, if well broken, you cannot put them out of place at any 

 kind of sport. 



The Irish Terrier is much too long in the legs, and not in 

 any way suitable for going to earth for fox or badger ; such sport 

 must be left to smaller breeds the Fox-terrier, Dandie, and others. 

 But above ground, no matter what the vermin, he can and will 

 give a good account of himself that is, so far as drawing a 

 badger from a tub is concerned. A better test to try a Terrier's 

 pluck is to turn upside-down a large wooden trough about loft, 

 long and having one end knocked out. Let the badger go to 

 the far end, and if you have a Terrier that will fetch him out, no 

 matter to what breed he belongs, you have a gem of the first 

 water. The writer knew a Bull-terrier bitch that would do this ; 

 but after having one of her legs broken from the bite of a badger, 

 she went more cautiously to work, and it looked comical to see 

 her tuck her front legs under her body when going to one to 

 avoid punishment. 



When a person talks of a Terrier killing a badger, you may be 

 sure that he is talking without knowledge it's all moonshine. 

 The writer has seen a good deal of badgers, and been to many 

 a badger dig in the Tidworth country with the late Assheton 

 Smith and Lord Broughton's keepers. Jack Fricker the Huntsman, 

 and Billy Brice, First Whip, always put in an appearance, and 

 brought some of the very gamest Fox-terriers that could be found 

 dogs that would go to earth and stay there till dug out hours 

 after. A captured badger turned down in the open would easily 

 run away with three of these Terriers hanging to him. The 

 punishment that a badger can inflict on a dog when in his natural 

 earth is truly terrible, and the Terrier that can kill one in such 

 has yet to be evolved. 



Mr. Erwin, speaking of Irish Terriers, says they have the 

 peculiarity of often appearing shy and timid, but their true nature 

 soon flashes out on occasion. Some of the pluckiest I have owned 



