THE ENGLISH MASTIFF. 



3i 



was bred I readily accepted the offer. 

 She was by Cardinal out of Cleopatra by 

 Cardinal out of Gwendolen by Monarch. 

 Putting her to her sire I obtained Empress 

 of Tring, a capital brindle of good size. 

 Just at the time I wanted a cross out, 

 Mr. Sidney Turner offered to let me have, 

 at quite a nominal price, Hotspur, a son 

 of Crown Prince, and a dog for which he 

 had refused £100 when a puppy. Mating 

 Empress of Tring with him, I got many 

 good Mastiffs, one of the best being Con- 

 stable, who made his debut at the show 

 held by the Kennel Club in 1887, where 

 he created a sensation among Mastiff 

 breeders. 



I have gone rather more into this than 

 I intended, but I want to demonstrate, in 

 the first place, that it is not always wise to 

 destroy a puppy, which, although it may 

 not be a show specimen, may prove from 

 its breeding invaluable as a stud dog or 

 brood bitch. I also wish to show that in- 

 breeding, if judiciously carried out, may 

 in certain instances prove of inestimable 

 advantage. My own experience of in- 

 breeding does not lead me to endorse the 

 opinion that it must necessarily cause a 

 diminution of size. In Toys it may be 

 resorted to with that particular object, 

 and, in that case, naturally the smallest 

 specimens would be bred from ; but I see 

 no reason why, if dogs of large size are 

 selected, it should not have a contrary 

 result. I am speaking of in-breeding car- 

 ried on within certain limits and not 

 indiscriminately. Nevertheless, close in- 

 breeding, if attempted by anyone not 

 understanding the principles of selection, 

 may prove disastrous. It is far easier 

 to perpetuate a fault than to eradicate 

 one, and, therefore, great care should be 

 exercised in the animals selected for the 

 experiment of in-breeding. 



Puppies should be allowed all the liberty 

 possible, and never be tied up : they 

 should be taken out for steady, gentle 

 exercise, and not permitted to get too fat 

 or they become too heavy, with detrimental 

 results to their legs. Many puppies are 

 very shy and nervous, but they will grow 



out of this if kindly handled, and eventu- 

 ally become the best guard and protector 

 it is possible to have. 



Some Mastiffs are possessed of strange 

 idiosyncrasies. Turk and many of his 

 descendants had a great antipathy to 

 butchers and butchers' shops. Neither of 

 my own two Mastiffs, Cardinal and Gwen- 

 dolen, would go near a butcher's shop if 

 it could be avoided, and I have frequently 

 been puzzled in walking through London 

 at four or five o'clock in the morning, on 

 my way to catch an early train to some 

 show, to know why these two dogs would 

 cross the road for no apparent reason, and 

 refuse to recross it until some way further 

 on. Eventually I discovered this invariably 

 happened when passing a butcher's shop. 

 At Norwich show Cardinal suddenly jumped 

 up and flew out at three visitors who 

 were standing admiring him. My man 

 remarked that there must be a butcher 

 close by, or the dog would never do such 

 a thing. The idea was laughed at, but 

 upon his saying he was sure it was so, 

 one of the three admitted that he was a 

 butcher. 



The temper of a Mastiff should be taken 

 into consideration by the breeder. They 

 are, as a rule, possessed of the best of 

 tempers, but there may be, of course, an 

 exception now and again. A savage dog 

 with such power as the Mastiff possesses 

 is indeed a dangerous creature, and, there- 

 fore, some inquiries as to the temper of 

 a stud dog should be made before deciding 

 to use him. Although I have owned Mas- 

 tiffs for between thirty and forty years, 

 and at one time I kept a somewhat large 

 kennel of them, I have never had the 

 misfortune to have a bad-tempered one. 

 In these dogs, as in all others, it is a question 

 of how they are treated by the person 

 having charge of them. 



The feeding of puppies is an important 

 matter, and should be carefully seen to 

 by anyone wishing to rear them success- 

 fully. If goat's milk is procurable it is 

 preferable to cow's milk. The price asked 

 for it is sometimes prohibitory, but this 

 difficulty may be surmounted in many 



