150 THE MASTIFF IX THE I QTH CENTURY. 



his estate by right should be forfeited to his use, said peremp- 

 torily enough (old John remarked to me) " Take her to the 

 gun room, John, take her to the gun room, lock the door, and 

 say nothing about her to anyone." This, to own the truth, 

 John remarked, suited his own inclination; at the same time, 

 not wishing to keep the dog, if he could trace that she 

 belonged to anyone in the locality ; he made a little enquiry, 

 and ascertained that a mastiff answering the description had 

 been seen the day before, passing through with some carts, y. 

 that had come out of Lancashire for teasels (carduus fullemrm, fw( 

 which were at that time used for raising the nap on woollen ' rt 

 cloth) and Crabtree had very little doubt but that she had come 

 from one of the Lancashire Cloth Mills, places where the mas- 

 tiff was kept in considerable numbers in past years, both for 

 fighting among each other, and as watch dogs. No enquiry 

 however was ever made after the bitch, and thus John Crab- 

 tree was started in mastiffs. In 1820 or 1821 he crossed this 

 bitch which he caught in the trap and named Duchess, with 

 Mr Holdsworth's Brindle Lion already mentioned, from this 

 alliance came a litter, among which was Bet, who John 

 Crabtree gave to a Mrs. Brewer, of the Three Nun's Public 

 House, Kirklees. The quaint old sign still exists, and I have 

 spent several happy hours under the roof of the little Inn 

 at different times' not worshipping Bacchus by imbibing 



" Inspiring bold John Barleycorn," 

 but feeding Mnemosyne, hearing of many 



" A touzie tyke, black, grim, aud large ;" 



listening to old John Crabtree and James Thompson talking 

 over their mastiffs, making notes, elucidating and compiling 

 the pedigrees. A dog puppy of the same litter as Mrs. 

 Brewer's Bet, Crabtree gave to Gibson of the Woodman Inn, 

 Bradley, Yorkshire ; Gibson being a sort of watcher for the 



