The Maltese Dog 693 



shown between 1864 and 1872. Mr. J. Jacobs of Oxford and Mrs. Bligh 

 Monk of Reading got dogs from Mandeville and the only dogs of the twenty 

 four in the first stud book that have any pedigree are of the Fido strain. In 

 a very few years these exhibitors retired and Lady GifFard, who started in 

 1874, soon became the only exhibitor. Lady Giffard obtained her 

 dogs from Mr. Jacobs and seemingly continued for some years to buy 

 the best he bred, until she had a wonderful collection. For many 

 years she was the only exhibitor of Maltese and no one who ever saw 

 the beautiful dogs shown in her name and the condition they were 

 always shown in will forget them. When Lady GifFard retired there seemed 

 to be no one in the fancy, all having given up the impossible task of beating 

 the Red Hill dogs. 



The usual revival took place after a while and now there is a Maltese 

 club, with a standard, which makes some changes from the dogs of the type 

 shown by Lady Giffard. Her dogs did not have low placed ears, but rather 

 high on the head and the new idea of having a straight flat coat was never 

 the old idea. The style of dog winning about 1880 looked quite bulky, one 

 might say, from the wealth of coat and in keeping with that was a rather 

 large looking head, caused by the set of the ears. The new idea seems to be 

 a Yorkshire terrier sort of dog, but that was not the old sort at all. They 

 seem also to have got the dogs far too large. The present standard says 

 not to exceed 12 pounds. Lady Giffard's Hugh weighed 4 pounds 10 ounces, 

 was 7I inches at the shoulder and had an ii-inch coat. The mystery to 

 show goers when Lady GifFard exhibited was how she managed to grow 

 such coats, for in place of nearly reaching the ground as the present standard 

 calls for, her dogs had coats which swept the ground on each side, and pure 

 in colour as the driven snow. English Maltese exhibitors cannot say they 

 are improving the breed if their standard is set where it ought to be a mark 

 yet to be reached. 



An attempt is being made to introduce coloured varieties, but it is as 

 out of place as to introduce any variation in the black and tan terrier. 

 The Maltese dog was always one of the colour breeds, a pure white dog. 

 If that is correct coloured dogs can only be obtained by introducing foreign 

 blood. 



Although such a thing as a good Maltese dog is all but unknown in this 

 country and few seem to care about taking up the fancy, the briefness of 

 the standard is an inducement to publish it. 



