CHAPTER VII 



Terriers Used in Sport 



fox dandie dinmonts skyes scottish 



Fox Terriers. — As this breed is associated with my 

 first prize, when a schoolboy, now, some years since, 

 but when dog shows were much rarer than " Black 

 Swans," were supposed to be, I have always taken 

 much interest in it, and have had many good specimens 

 of both the Smooth, and Wirehaired, varieties into 

 which the breed is divided. They are both very good 

 and both have hosts of admirers. Some of the fanciers 

 now exhibiting, will remember, with me, the time when 

 no classes were provided for the " Wirehairs," and you 

 had (as I have often done) to show them as " Broken- 

 haired Terriers," and often meet in your class nearly all 

 the members of that heterogeneous family, such as 

 Dandies, Skyes, Bedlingtons, Scottish (Airedales did 

 not exist then), Irish, and old English, enough to try 

 the temper of judge and exhibitors, and making the de- 

 cision quite a matter of the specimen best shower 

 and shown. But since those days, Fox Terriers have 

 enjoyed a long term of popularity, and so far from the 

 " Wirehaired " section being ignored, I have seen at 

 some shows more entries in it than that of their Smooth" 

 brethren, and the figures given for high class specimens, 



117 



