72 The Collie or Sheep Dog. 



Nottingham in 1872-3 provided classes for smooths, but the 

 Birmingham executive proved very dilatory in encouraging 

 this strain, and it was not until 1874 that Curzon Hall 

 honoured it by giving a special classification for this useful 

 farmer's dog. There is no doubt he is not so handsome as 

 his rough-coated relative ; he is equally sagacious and even 

 more useful when in work. North-country farmers say that 

 the heavily -coated dogs cannot do the work on the rough fell 

 lands so well as the smooth, that they are not so hardy and 

 not nearly so fast ; and to be successful and thoroughly com- 

 petent in his duties a collie must have a fair degree of pace. 



I have known a smooth dog that could catch an ordinary 

 hare if the latter did not obtain too long a start. I have 

 also seen a rough-coated dog do likewise, but the latter took 

 a short cut up to a gate through which he knew puss would 

 go, and there snapped her, but the smooth dog galloped 

 his game down in a fair course, with points by turns, 

 wrenches, and the ultimate kill. A dangerous sort of dog 

 for the farmer to keep, for in the long run it would be 

 certain to get either its master or some of his servant lads 

 into trouble with the neighbouring gamekeepers. These 

 smooth dogs, crossed with a greyhound, make the best 

 lurchers, and some of the crack rabbit-coursing dogs so 

 commonly used in Lancashire and Durham by the pitmen 

 and others, are so bred. The first cross between the two is 

 re-crossed with the greyhound again and again, until any 

 resemblance to the collie is entirely removed. Such dogs 

 have almost the pace of the pure greyhound, and often 

 enough far more than his skill at the turn or in the kill. 



The lowlands of Scotland produce some few smooth- 

 coated collies, which no doubt originally came from this 

 side of the border ; their type and character are the same, 



