DOGS OF CHINA AND JAPAN 



baiting, in which sport a tethered bull with blunted or 

 padded horns was pitted against dogs which he sometimes 

 tossed thirty or forty feet high, was a pastime almost national 

 in importance for centuries. Pepys remarks in 1666 that he 

 ; ' saw some good sport of the bull's tossing of the dogs, one 

 into the very boxes." * 



In 1557 the envoy of the Duke of Mantua, after remarking 

 that in the Tower of London " there is a seraglio in which 

 from grandeur they keep lions and tigers and cat-lions," goes 

 on to say that " there is the bear garden in Southwark, on 

 the banks of the Thames, where they keep big dogs to rear 

 for breeding, and to exercise them there are bears, wolves 

 and bulls ; so for such purposes they become very good 

 dogs (buonissimi cant)," In 1608 to 1610 James I sent dogs 

 as presents to the princes of Anhalt and Brunswick, also to 

 the Ambassador of Brandenburg. In 1614 the Venetian 

 Ambassador in Spain reported that there had recently arrived 

 from James of England a present to Philip of Spain including 

 ' palfreys, dogs for hunting lions, arquebuses and sables and 

 crossbows." In 1614 General Saris was employed by the 

 East India Company in opening up trade with Japan, and 

 was received in a very friendly manner by certain of the 

 Japanese feudal lords. As a result of his observations he 

 wrote to the " Captain Generall of the English appoynted to 

 Japan " that he should " make some small present to the 

 daimio of Hirado and Iki, and to his son. The fittest things 

 for the owld Kinge wilbe a vest of delicatt fine blacke cloth 



* These barbarities cannot compare with those recorded by travellers in mediaeval 

 India. " Sometimes this manner of execution [tearing asunder by elephants] is used 

 by the Kinge [of Agra] and great men, Alsoe throwne to doggs bredd for that purpose. 

 Other tymes to wilde beasts, Yea, Sometymes appoyntinge certain men to teare the 

 offender with their teeth, of which Cuttwall Chaun was said to bee one, Commaunded 

 thereto by Jehangueere [Jahangir] because hee was a bigg feilowe and had a good 

 sett of teeth." " The Travels of Peter Mundy," Hakluyt Society, ser. II, vol. xxv, 

 p. 232. 



4 6 



