CHAPTER III. 

 THE BRITISH MASTIFF. 



" Bold were those Britons who the careless son's 

 Of nature roam'd the forest bounds at once, 

 Their verdeut city, high embowering fane 

 And the gay circle of their woodlacd wars." 



Thomjtson's Liberty. 



FROM the preceding chapters it will be seen that dogs of a 

 true mastiff type have existed from the earliest times, and it 

 has been conjectured that the Phoenicians introduced the 

 Assyrian or Asiatic mastiff into Britain. 



Col. H. Smith says, the mastiff is often reckoned an indi- 

 genous variety of Great Britain, but he believed that it was 

 imported by the Cimbric Celtse, and as this species is known 

 to exist in High Asia, it is likely from thence we obtained it. 



Bochartus, (the celebrated Oriental scholar and author of 

 " History of the Animals of Scripture," who died at Caen in 

 1667), states that the Phoenicians came as far as the islands 

 called Casseterides (i.e. Sicily Islands) which abounded in tin. 

 That they also came to Cornwall, and called Britain Barac- 

 tanac or Bractanack i.e. the land of tin. 



Strabo, pages 14 and 265, states that the Phoenician 

 commerce with the Belgiae and Britons was carried on by a 

 system of barter and exchange without the aid of money, so 

 also was the more recent commerce carried on during the age 

 of Augustus and Tiberias by the Phoenicians with the Britons, 

 whose money at Cassar's first invasion consisted merely of 

 pieces of brass without any impression, and iron bullion. 



