52 THE GREYHOUND. 



and, to do so without the direct aid of a friendly adviser, 

 whose experience and judgment can be relied on, such 

 books as the " Coursing Calendar," " Greyhound Stud 

 Book," and other records of coursing must be consulted. 



Throughout the history of the sport, since the record of 

 its minutest details began, we find that at succeeding in- 

 tervals one or more Greyhounds, or a family of them, 

 have exhibited merit so superior to their contemporaries 

 as to have become famous, and with the consequence of a 

 run upon the strain by breeders, resulting in a wide diffu- 

 sion of that blood, and its commingling with other blood 

 also highly valued by its possessors. Such practice has 

 tended to general improvement, and to the formation of 

 the striking family likeness among Greyhounds which now 

 exists to a degree it never did before, rendering distinc- 

 tion of strains visible only to the eye of the practical con- 

 noisseur. 



Pedigrees may be said to have come in with the clubs ; 

 but even then, and until quite recent times, very strict atten- 

 tion to descent was not paidr especially was the pedigree 

 of the dam neglected, although of equal importance with 

 that of the sire. An excellent instance of this occurs in 

 the pedigree of Snowball, the wonder of his time, and 

 I believe the first Greyhound that was at stud use to the 

 public, which he was from the year 1800 to 1803, if not 

 later, at a fee of 3 3s. His grand-dam was Lord Orford's 

 Czarina, a yellow bitch of unknown pedigree, that won 

 forty-seven matches without being defeated. Snowball was 

 owned by Major Topham, a coursing celebrity, and his 

 dog's fame has been preserved in the lines of Sir Walter 

 Scott : 



