The Fox Terrier. 101 



setter to set, the pointer to point, the spaniel to 

 beat the coverts, and the terrier to make pilgrimages 

 underground. Nor did they condescend to train the 

 latter to run after rabbits, as in modern coursing 

 matches ; and they took for the most part the bull 

 terrier to bait the badger and perform in the rat pit. 

 '' A dash of bulldog blood" was always said to 

 improve the pluck of a terrier (it certainly does not 

 add to his elegance of form), and so no doubt came 

 the brindle marks on some few of the modern fox 

 terriers. Careful crossing has almost effaced the 

 first named, now considered a blemish, and in its 

 place the rich tan and black, or hound markings, 

 have been introduced. Originally these gaudy 

 colours were produced by some beagle blood, which, 

 I fancy, came to be infused about thirty-five years 

 ago. The large, flapping, almost hound-like, ears 

 which still occasionally crop up, and were exces- 

 sively common twenty years back, likewise suggest 

 this beagle cross, and I have no doubt, from a 

 modern black and tan terrier and a hound-marked 

 pure beagle, careful selection would in very few 

 generations produce a fox terrier with a black and 

 tan head and a patch on the body or at the root of 

 the stern. Of a whilom champion a well-known 

 admirer of the variety was wont to declare, " she 

 had ears like a blacksmith's apron." 



