Juliana Berners. 3 



rather than of politics, just as is the case at the 

 present day with some of our country squires. Small 

 •dogs as pets and companions were known amongst the 

 Egyptians. Empresses caressed and fondled them long 

 before Great Britain had become a mighty power in the 

 world. Civilisation could afford to keep such luxuries 

 which semi-barbarity could not. As our civilisation 

 increased, the huge, savage dogs which our conquerors 

 imported to the Roman arena were allowed to languish, 

 and the fierce mastiff gave place to the more gentle 

 hound, followed by the spaniel, and later by the pet dogs 

 and little terriers. By selection the latter could easily be 

 manufactured. Any person with the taste and inclination 

 so to do, could produce a new variety of dog, say, in ten 

 years. No wonder, then, that at the present time so many 

 breeds and varieties are distributed throughout the universe. 

 Possibly in England there are more than in any other 

 country, not excepting even America, whose citizens have 

 of late years emulated us by their admiration of these 

 favoured little quadrupeds. 



That gallant lady, Dame Juliana Berners, with whose 

 quaint and early treatise on angling most devotees of Izaak 

 Walton are well acquainted, discoursed with equal ability 

 upon hunting and cognate subjects. In that portion of the 

 "" Book of St. Albans " dealing with venerie, and which 

 was published in i486, some ten years or so before the 

 chapter on angling was added, the terrier is only casually 

 alluded to, for the reason, no doubt, that the wild boar 

 and the stag were far ahead in the estimation of the hunter 

 than the fox — even the hare in those days receiving more 

 attention as a quarry than reynard. One would very much 

 like to have heard what the Abbess of Sopewell said of 



B 2 



