ON THE BENCH. 189 



ing the ribbon to some well-known exhibitor who always 

 has good ones, than by following his own fancy, which he 

 realizes might be for a bad one. 



Perhaps relatively fewer cases of this are occurring now 

 than in the past, yet it is plainly evident that there is 

 still great chance for improvement, and the sooner show 

 managements realize this the better for them and for the 

 dog, whose improvements should be paramount to self- 

 interest. Clearly a man who has not had the experience 

 to warrant him in undertaking the task of judging should 

 not accept the position. Manifestly, also, the exhibitor 

 who spends time and money in getting a good kennel 

 together has a right to expect that his dogs will be judged 

 by a competent person. And, for obvious reasons, the 

 man who has inferior dogs desires inferior judges ; while 

 the better the judges the smaller the chances of a poor 

 specimen getting to the front. 



All this is evidently duly appreciated by exhibitors who 

 should rightly be the most influential, for there is a rapidly 

 growing disposition on their part to have their dogs 

 placed under qualified men only, they appreciating fully 

 that the incompetent judges make improvement well-nigh 

 impossible. 



Such being the disposition of exhibitors to-day, and since 

 the remedy lies largely with them, the fault of incompe- 

 tency in judges must dissipate steadily and rapidly ; and 

 it is scarcely necessary to add that it is the bounden duty 

 of all having interest in the matter to hasten its decline. 



Before leaving exhibitors there is yet an important point 

 to be touched upon. Beyond dispute one of the most 

 potent causes of the great mortality among puppies is an 

 inherent weakness transmitted from either the sire or 

 dam — and most often the former, in the selection of 

 which long pedigrees and prize-winning records are so 



