The First Bench Winner. 43 



dog outside his own fold, and Laddie, or whatever his name 

 might be, had not then developed an eminence as a 

 " fashionable beauty," a distinction which was attained 

 later on ; little wonder then that this first shepherds' dog 

 class was a small one five entries all told. The judging 

 was undertaken by Mr. W. Lort, who is still to be found, as 

 brisk and skilful as ever, awarding honour in the ring to 

 either horses or dogs, and by the late Mr. J. H. Walsh 

 ("Stonehenge"). In the end but one prize was awarded, it 

 going to what was called a " pure Scotch bitch," exhibited 

 by Mr. W. Wakefield, of Hurley, Warwickshire, who thus 

 had the honour of taking the first show bench prize ever 

 offered for a shepherd's dog. Two others of the entries 

 were Scotch, collies shall I write, but the word was not in 

 common use even then, excepting in Scotland and nearer 

 the borders. The remaining exhibits were called English 

 sheepdogs. 



How different this one class for the variety thirty years 

 ago from the ten that were provided in 1889 five entries 

 then, one hundred and six now. But at Liverpool show, 

 held during January, 1890, the entry for collies reached the 

 extraordinary number of 245, owing, no doubt, to the 

 excellent classification provided. There were, however, 

 not that number of individual dogs benched, as several of 

 the animals competed in more than one class. Still the 

 figures show what strides in public estimation this dog has 

 made during the last three decades. 



For some time immediately following 1860 shepherd's 

 dogs did not form a leading feature at any of the shows, 

 and ten years later, Birmingham could only boast of an 

 entry of fourteen, when a dog, that I consider one of the 

 very best of the variety ever shown, took second honours. 



