THE BRITISH PUGNACES. 6l 



the neck and shoulders are vast, limbs short, and stern fine. 

 Rough as it is, the type is precisely the same as the mastiffs 

 depicted on the Castor ware. 



It may be thought that the mastiff would be too slow to 

 catch a hind, and no doubt, owing to bad rearing, over and 

 injudicious feeding, and want of exercise, rendering many 

 specimens more like show pigs than gladiators, the majority 

 of mastiffs should be so, but when the mastiff is well reared, 

 they have considerable speed for a short distance, and at 

 Kirklees Hall, Yorkshire, John Crabtree, the head keeper, 

 had several of the deer run down and killed by his mastiffs 

 from time to time. 



On one occasion when walking through a deer park, I came 

 across a fawn, asleep, it started up under my feet almost, and 

 bounded off at a great pace, my mastiff dog, Young King ii., 

 giving chase, and although I shouted to him to stop, it was of 

 no avail, and I shall never forget the beautiful, yet to me sad 

 sight, the little creature made straight off to the main herd, 

 the dog keeping on after it right through them and singling 

 it out, and continuing the pursuit, leaving them all off in 

 another direction. What was the most painful part was 

 hearing the piteous, terrified cries of the little animal, and 

 seeing its mother gyrating in order to try and baffle the dog, 

 who however, much to my surprise, literally chased it down 

 and worried it savagely, threatening to do the same to the 

 dam if she approached too near. He was a well-grown, active 

 animal of usually most gentle disposition. 



In order to show that the mastiff like dogs, on the Romano 

 Britannic ware, were not merely a conventional form of the 

 potter artist, Mr. Wickham forwarded me a tracing of a 

 drawing made from some of this early British pottery, on 



