The Deerhound. 213 



name through the negHgence or over-indulgence of 

 its owner. 



As already stated, dog shows have been of infinite 

 advantage in raising the deerhound to its present 

 popularity, though prior to this epoch, what Sir 

 Walter Scott writes of his Maida and other favourite 

 hounds, with Landseer's fine paintings, had made 

 the general pubHc anxious to see such handsome 

 hounds in the flesh. The first show at Birmingham, 

 in i860, provided two classes for them, but there 

 were few entries, and both leading prizes were taken 

 by Lieut. -Colonel Inge, of Thorpe, near Tamworth, 

 who, at that time, possessed a capital strain of deer- 

 hounds. Later on the numbers increased, and in 

 1862 there were ten competitors in the dog class, 

 but they were a mixed lot, though the winner, called 

 Alder, bred by Sir John Macneil, was a splendid 

 specimen, which again took leading honours two 

 years later. The succeeding show had, for some 

 reason or other, a capital entry, sixteen in the one 

 class, six in the other, and these included several 

 dogs from the Highlands, one of the latter, called 

 Oscar, now beating Alder, who looked old and worn, 

 and was past his best. 



About this period Lord Henry Bentinck took great 

 pride in his deerhounds, and kept a fine kennel of 

 them. In 1870 they were sold by auction in 



