26 The Fox Terrier. 



was considered not amiss and weighed anything between 

 i2\b. and 3olb., he was called a fox terrier and sold as 

 such. He had a pedigree, made for the occasion perhaps. 

 And why ! if his ears were too big, they could be sliced 

 down, as they sometimes were, and if they stood up erect 

 instead of dropping, they could be cut underneath, and 

 often were, and made to hang in the orthodox fashion. 



The British public had not then learned to distinguish 

 between one dog and another, long heads, straight legs, 

 round feet, and other important essentials were considered 

 secondary considerations when placed against an evenly- 

 marked " black and tan " head " tortoiseshell headed " a 

 clerical friend called my little terrier, and he thought he 

 had made a good joke, too. With the multitude came, for 

 once at least, wisdom, and when Tom, Bill, and Harry 

 kept fox terriers, those who had possessed them before 

 required a better article. The youngsters studied from 

 their elders, hob-nobbed with fanciers, and so by degrees 

 obtained an inkling as to the requirement and appearance 

 of a perfect terrier, or one as nearly perfect as possible. Any 

 kind of rubbish almost could have been palmed off as the 

 genuine article a quarter of a century ago ; but a difference 

 prevails now. Go to a dog show to-morrow, and eighteen 

 out of every twenty persons you meet not excepting the 

 " new woman," who is making herself as great a power at 

 the dog show as she has done in the County Council will 

 argue with you as to the relative merits of this dog and 

 about the defects of that one. They wonder at your 

 presumption, perhaps, as you give your opinion against 

 theirs. They will even talk to the judge himself, and 

 tell him where he has done wrong, and how that terrier 

 ought to have won and the actual winner only been placed 



