334 The Dog Book 



twenty-five years ago mainly because she was particularly well spotted on 

 the legs and on the side of the cheeks with a nice liver colour. 



We may be wrong in our recollection, but we think the Dalmatian 

 up to that time was a somewhat larger and stronger dog than we have 

 seen of late. They were used far more to accompany carriages in London 

 than can be seen now; and going back thirty-five years still more were to 

 be seen, many cropped closely, not like the bull terrier or Great Dane, 

 but as the pug was, the entire ear being cut off. This practice was not 

 entirely discontinued as late as i860, though it was going out of fashion 

 rapidly then. Thirty years before that it was spoken of as being discon- 

 tinued, but we can very well remember seeing many Dalmatians and pugs 

 mutilated in this fashion, and they were by no means so exceptional as to 

 excite comment. 



At that time a common name for the Dalmatian was Talbot, but we 

 do not find it in any of the books of that period, nor indeed in any book 

 we have except the lately issued "Twentieth-Century Dog," to which 

 Mrs. Bedwell contributes some remarks, and says: "The 'Talbot' is no 

 pumped-up modern breed." The Talbot we know was a hound, one of 

 the tracking kind, and of the white varieties known in England the all 

 white was considered excellent; so were the all black. "But if white 

 hounds are spotted with black, experience tells us they are never the best 

 hare hunters. White, and black and white, and grey streaked white are 

 also the most beautiful." That was what was written several hundred 

 years ago. 



It is easy to say now that the Dalmatians are not hounds. True, 

 they are not what we know as hounds, but what did they mean to include 

 or exclude when they said hounds in these bygone days. We know what 

 we mean by a mastiff, but who can say what mastiff meant, even in 1700. 

 For instance, in an old sportsman's dictionary the description of "Wolf" 

 begins with "a kind of wild mastiff." At the end of "Bandog" it says, 

 "See Shepherd's mastiff." There is neither mastiff nor shepherd's mastiff 

 in the book, but we know that what we call the smooth collie was then 

 the shepherd's mastiff. So instead of Talbot being quite out of place as 

 a name for the Dalmatian, it is more than likely that it was the lingering 

 survival of what the dog originally was among persons who did not keep 

 up to date in changes of nomenclature, just as one hears some old timer 

 speak of a "rare bull and terrier." 



