158 The Fox Terrier. 



early sporting dogs rushed before him when he told me 

 of a terrier he had owned with an extraordinarily long head, 

 which came from the Quorn when Sir Richard Sutton was 

 the master. This dog, he said, was in every sense a 

 pattern of the best we see to-day, i81b. weight, hard 

 coated, strong-jawed, possessing at the same time the 

 ''ferocity of the tiger" when "cats" were about, and 

 " the gentleness of the dove " in the presence of his genial 

 owner. The late Mr. C. M. Browne (" Robin Hood") was 

 inclined to believe that a majority of the Midland counties 

 strains of wire-haired terriers sprang from this dog, which 

 became the property of Mr. T. Wootton, who certainly had 

 some very good ones about twenty years later, though that 

 they were all as game as one would have wished may be 

 doubted by the following story : 



In the early days of competition, a dog show was held 

 in a certain town in the North of England, at which some 

 two or three of these terriers, said to be " good at badger, 

 cat, fox, and fighting," were exhibited, and as usual they 

 won all the prizes. At 1 1 o'clock one night, some of 

 the members of the committee, after dining rather heartily, 

 and supping not too wisely but too well, visited the show, 

 and in company with the " nightmen " went round to see 

 the terriers. Now unfortunately a semi-tame fox was one 

 of the attractions of the exhibition, and mischief moved 

 the midnight visitors to try some of the crack " wire-hairs " 

 with that fox. Alack ! alas ! they knew sly reynard not, 

 nor did they take the slightest notice of him as they 

 were one by one slipped into his cage — the " earth dogs" 

 bolted so far as their collars and chains allowed them. 

 "Try Sir Douglas!" said a fellow, alluding to a well- 

 known Dandie Dinmont benched not far away, and Sir 



