The Mastiff. 21 



after likewise, is a matter of history. In 1871 sixty- 

 nine mastiffs were benched at one of the Crystal 

 Palace shows, and at Birmingham the same year 

 there were twenty-nine competitors in the open dog 

 class. There were men at that time who bred 

 their dogs with care, and they had not commenced 

 to breed for exaggerated heads to the sacrifice of 

 qualities equally important. 



Earlier than the Turk epoch, Mr. E. Hanbury, 

 from Wiltshire, was showing some good dogs, and 

 not many years later Mr. E. Nichols, of South 

 Kensington, who survives, and takes as much 

 interest in them as ever, would not look at any 

 dog that possessed the round bull-headed skull 

 introduced a little later. Bill George's Tiger, whose 

 name will be found in the pedigrees of most 

 modern mastiffs, was no great wonder in the 

 way of size, but his head was correctly shaped, 

 and if he was underhung at all it was very 

 little. I never saw the dog myself, but whilst 

 one authority says Tiger's lower jaw protruded, 

 I am told that this was not the case. Mr. 

 Lukey's Governor was not undershot, but no doubt 

 some of the early dogs were so deformed, still 

 with this defect they had not the additional ones 

 of crooked and too twisted hocks, so prevalent as 

 I write in 1893. 



