Modern Dogs. 



labours have not had a successful result. A dog's 

 pedigree for a hundred years, excepting, maybe, 

 in a foxhound or greyhound, is not to be compiled 

 with any degree of exactitude. Still there have 

 been in this country, from earliest records to the 

 present time, a breed of dog that has done duty 

 as the mastiff, and so well has he performed his 

 part that he may be well called the most historical 

 dog of the day. 



By the Romans and some others he was abased 

 by the purposes to which he was put, for I do 

 not believe he was ever intended as a hunting dog, 

 or for the purpose of fighting with much more 

 powerful beasts than himself. It has been said that 

 King James I. loosed a powerful mastiff against a 

 lion, to the discomfiture of the former, and a kennel 

 companion met a like fate. But a third dog did 

 so much better, worsting his antagonist, that the 

 King said, " He that had fought the king of beasts 

 should never fight a meaner creature," and forthwith 

 this good "mastive" became a pensioner on the 

 royal bounty. This is said to have happened in 

 1604, and about sixteen years later the same 

 monarch prohibited bear-baiting on a Sunday. At 

 this time it was the custom to crop the ears of 

 most of the mastiffs, and in some cases their sterns 

 were shortened likewise. 



