56 The Collie or Sheep Dog. 



an admirer of the gentle race. We next see the dog in a 

 selling class at Gloucester, where, attracting the eye 

 of Mr. S. Boddington, of Birmingham, he was claimed 

 for 5. In four months more, that astute judge having 

 christened his new purchase Rutland, showed him to such 

 advantage that the dog had become a champion, was 

 recognised as about the best of his variety before the 

 public, and as such was eventually sold to Mr. A. H. Meg- 

 son, of Manchester for, it is said, 250. Cockie had been 

 purchased in one of the markets in the Midlands for a 

 couple of pounds. Mec, another champion, was picked up 

 for little more than that sum, and here we have a third 

 pillar of the collie world once given away, then sold for 

 fifty shillings, eventually to find a purchaser and a happy 

 home for the extraordinary sum of 250, for which quite a 

 flock of very good sheep could be obtained. Do not 

 prices such as these prove some indication that the farmer, 

 in these times of agricultural depression, might add to his 

 revenue by endeavouring to breed Rutlands, Mecs, and 

 Cockies. Surely, if he could not produce animals quite of 

 their value he might be able to obtain specimens worth 10 

 or 20 ; at any rate, conducted on a small scale, breeding 

 from good strains of the collie would be much more 

 remunerative than poultry keeping and fruit culture on a 

 large scale. 



Rutland, a medium-sized dog, of black and tan colour, 

 without any white tag or collar to relieve the two shades, 

 was not quite so attractive to the eye as gaudier markings 

 would have made him. Still, he was a dog of that good 

 class that the more you looked at him the better he 

 pleased, and, indeed, there was little fault to be found with 

 him, although personally he would have pleased better 



