MODERN HARRIERS 91 



ments. It is also the means of settling, when appealed 

 to, any differences or disputes referred to it. The 

 Peterborough Show and Stud-book have done in- 

 calculable good in improving the breed of harrier. 

 The chief good in a hound show is to be able to see 

 all the best dog-hounds together. This is a great 

 advantage to the careful breeder. It has a good 

 effect in smaller ways, such as the way hounds are 

 turned out, a good lesson to Hunt servants, and even 

 to their own personal appearance. I have noticed a 

 marked change in these respects since the show was 

 originated. 



" I was on the original committee appointed by 

 the Association in 1891 to investigate and report 

 as to what a harrier should be. The committee found 

 there were perhaps twelve or fifteen different kinds of 

 hounds hunting the hare, more than half the owners 

 calling their hounds pure harriers,* though quite diverse 

 in type, such as the Brookside, Sir John Amory's, the 

 Southern, the blue-mottled Northern, the Welsh, 

 the Shotesham, the Duke of Hamilton's. If any 

 one type had been selected there would have been 

 few to adopt it, so the committee recommended that 

 all hounds, however bred — foxhound, the many types 

 of pure harrier, and the many different types of cross- 

 breeds — should be admitted to the Stud-book, and then 

 the book be closed, leaving the future to develop a 

 type. This recommendation was unanimously agreed 

 to, and the results have proved good, a greater 

 similarity of type existing now, and the improvement 

 in make and shape being very marked." 



* In a note upon this point Colonel Aikman says : " I 

 take exception to the division of harriers into ' Stud-book ' 

 and ' Pure Harrier.' Let it be Stud-book and Non-Stud 

 hook Harrier." 



