201 



THE WATER-DOG. 



Canis aquations. 



PLATE XX. 



Barbet of the Continent. 



THIS race of dogs has the head rather large and 

 round, the cerebral space more developed than in 

 any other canine, the frontal sinus expanded, the 

 ears long, the legs rather short, and the body com- 

 pact ; the hair over every part of the animal long, 

 curly, black, or white and black, sometimes rufous ; 

 height at the shoulder from eighteen to twenty 

 inches. The water-dog, or poodle of the Germans, 

 is in its most perfect state not a British race, but 

 rose into favour first in Germany, and during the 

 revolutionary wars was carried by the troops into 

 France, and only in the latter campaigns became 

 familiar to the British in Spain and the Netherlands. 

 The coarser crisped-haired water-dog was indeed 

 long known to the middle classes of England, and to 

 fishermen on the north-eastern coast and profes- 

 sional water-fowl shooters; he was occasionally 

 also brought to the environs of London, in order 

 to afford the brutal sport of hunting and worrying 

 to death domestic ducks placed in ponds for that 



