116 The Fox Terrier. 



Riot was a curiosity in this way, for she would stuff her 

 nose into a hole or opening of any kind, and there give 

 tongue loudly enough almost to rouse the Seven Sleepers. 

 Anyhow she usually alarmed the rats, which plumped into 

 the water and were then soon killed. She was as quick as 

 lightning at this game, and in the sport of boyhood's days 

 she quite broke the heart of a favourite bull terrier of mine, 

 also a keen rat hunter, by killing every one before he could 

 get near them. This went on so long and to such an extent 

 that the bull terrier ultimately refused to hunt at all when 

 Riot was present, and so he was sent away. As a watch 

 dog in a Lancashire warehouse I am told he did not prove 

 a success. 



Riot I had well-nigh lost, and when she was heavy in 

 pup too. We had a few rats in the cellar at home, and 

 the old bitch was fond of watching for them as they came 

 out of a small hole in the wall. She had been missed for 

 an hour or so, and going down into the aforesaid cellar 

 there was the terrier with her head tightly jammed in a hole 

 so small that one would wonder how even a rat could get 

 through. There the poor thing was as fast as possible, and 

 I had sent one of the servants for a neighbouring mason to 

 bring his hammer and tools to free her, when just before 

 his arrival I managed to get her released. She had, no 

 doubt, rushed with such force and at so great a pace to- 

 wards a rat disappearing in the hole that her head became 

 jammed as we found it. Luckily Riot, excepting for some 

 slight abrasions, was little the worse for her accident, and 

 I need scarcely say that " hole in the wall " was carefully 

 plastered up. 



Of course there are some terriers that will take more 

 naturally to work than others, but any of mine, when once 



