THE MASTIFF IN THE l8TH CENTURY. 14! 



The 1792 edition of the Encyclopaedia Britannica contains 

 a cut of the Mastiff by Bewick, but this edition is very scarce, 

 and the dog is precisely the same as that figured in Bewick's 

 Quadrupeds. The 1797 edition of the Ency. Britannica 

 contains a cut of the mastiff, plate 118, drawn by A. Bell, and 

 engraved by Wai. This dog has considerably less of the true 

 mastiff character, and marks the decline of the breed, which 

 commenced about 1750 to 1800; the dog shows more of the 

 hound type, the limbs however are very massive, but the 

 drawing is inferior to that of Bewick, the hind legs being very 

 badly depicted, the animal has however the characteristic 

 white on face, neck, breast, flank, legs, and tip of stern. 



Bewick ends his article on the bandog by saying : " The 

 generality of dogs distinguished by that name seem to be 

 compounded of the bulldog, Danish mastiff, (i.e. Great Dane) 

 and the bandog." This seems to show that while Bewick 

 recognised the term bandog to mean the mastiff, yet the 

 generality of mastiff-like watchdogs of his day had been very 

 much crossed, mongrehzed, and debased in type. 



Of Bewick himself we may say he possessed something of 

 the humour of his great predecessor Hogarth, who like him, 

 was in his youth an engraver, having been employed to 

 engrave silver tankards ; but Bewick was a lover of nature, 

 and followed more closely perhaps the homely style of 

 George Moreland, who died in 1806, leaving some splendid 

 representations of canine form in his day. 



Over the life-like humour of these great masters it has 

 justly been said, an artist who neglects expression gives no 

 just representation of character even though he should take 

 nature for his model. While their animals cause us almost 

 to anticipate their next movement. 



