HISTORICAL NOTICES OF DEERHOUNDS. 221 



weighed 85 Ibs. The hair was hard, not very rough, wiry only on head and legs. He was 

 pupped in 1832, and was looked upon as a remarkably staunch and useful dog. McNeill con- 

 sidered that the purest dogs of his time were sandy or fawn in colour, and hard coated, but 

 he also tells us that "there are dogs in the Lochabar district which are dark in colour 

 and have a softer coat." 



From " Chambers's Information for the People," published in 1842, the following extract is 

 taken : " The Scottish Highland Greyhound will either hunt in packs or singly. He is an animal 

 of great size and strength, and at the same time very swift of foot. In size he equals, if 

 not excels, the Irish Greyhound. His head is long and the nose sharp; his ears short and 

 somewhat pendulous at the tips ; his eyes are brilliant and very penetrating, and half-concealed 

 by the long crisp hair which covers his face and whole body. He is remarkable for the 

 depth of his chest, and tapers gradually towards the loins, which are of great strength and 

 very muscular; his back is slightly arched; his hind quarters are powerfully formed, and his 

 limbs strong and straight. The possession of these combined qualities particularly fit him for 

 long endurance in the chase. His usual colour is reddish sand-colour mixed with white ; his 

 tail is long and shaggy, which he carries high like the Staghound, although not quite so 

 erect. He is a noble dog, and was used by the Scottish Highland chieftains in their great 

 hunting parties, and is supposed to have descended in regular succession from the dogs of 

 Ossian." 



St. John, in his "Wild Sports of the Highlands," published in 1846, says: "The breed 

 of Deerhounds, which had nearly become extinct, or at any rate was very rare a few years 

 ago, has now become comparatively plentiful in all the Highland districts, owing to the in- 

 creased extent of the preserved forests and the trouble taken by the different proprietors 

 and renters of mountain shootings, who have collected and bred this noble race of dogs, 

 regardless of expense and difficulties. The prices given for a well-bred and tried dog of this 

 kind are so large that it repays the cost and trouble of rearing him. Fifty guineas is not an 

 unusual price for a first-rate dog, while from twenty to thirty are frequently given for a 

 tolerable one." 



" Started this morning at daybreak with Donald and Malcolm Mohr, as he is called 

 {Anglic^ Malcolm the Great, or Big Malcolm), who had brought his two Deerhounds Bran 

 and Oscar, to show me how they could kill a stag. The dogs were perfect : Bran an 

 immense but beautifully-made dog of a light colour, with black eyes and muzzle, his ears of a 

 dark brown, soft and silky as a lady's hand, the rest of his coat being wiry and harsh, though 

 not exactly rough and shaggy, like his comrade Oscar, who was long-haired and of a darker 

 brindle colour, with sharp long muzzle, but the same soft ears as Bran, which, by-the-bye, is a 

 distinctive mark of high breeding in these days." 



The "Museum of Animated Nature," published in 1848 50, has the following: "In 

 Scotland and Ireland there existed in very ancient times a noble breed of Greyhound, 

 used for the chase of the wolf and the deer, which appears to us to be the pure 

 source of our present breed ; it is quite as probable that the Matin is a modification of 

 the ancient Greyhound of Europe, represented by the Irish Greyhound or Wolfdog, as 

 that it is the source of that fine breed. Few, we believe, of the old Irish Greyhound 

 exist. In Scotland the old Deerhound may still be met with, and though it exceeds the 



