318 DOGS AND ALL ABOUT THEM 



dog yet bred is the one which approaches nearest to Nature's 

 wise intention. 



The foregoing chapters have given abundant examples of 

 how the various breeds of the dog have been acquired, 

 manufactured, improved, resuscitated, and retained. Broadly 

 speaking, two methods have been adopted : The method of 

 introducing an outcross to impart new blood, new strength, 

 new character ; and the method of inbreeding to retain an 

 approved type. An outcross is introduced when the breed 

 operated upon is declining in stamina or is in danger 

 of extinction, or when some new physical or mental 

 quality is desired. New types and eccentricities are 

 hardly wanted, however, and the extreme requirements of 

 an outcross may nowadays be achieved by the simple process 

 of selecting individuals from differing strains of the same 

 breed, mating a bitch which lacks the required points with a 

 dog in whose family they are prominently and consistently 

 present. 



Inbreeding is the reverse of outcrossing. It is the practice 

 of mating animals closely related to each other, and it is, 

 within limits, an entirely justifiable means of preserving and 

 intensifying family characteristics. It is a law in zoology 

 that an animal cannot transmit a quality which it does not 

 itself innately possess, or which none of its progenitors has 

 ever possessed. By mating a dog and a bitch of the same 

 family, therefore, you concentrate and enhance the uniform 

 inheritable qualities into one line instead of two, and you 

 reduce the number of possibly heterogeneous ancestors by 

 exactly a half right back to the very beginning. There is no 

 surer way of maintaining uniformity of type, and an examina- 

 tion of the extended pedigree of almost any famous dog will 

 show how commonly inbreeding is practised. Inbreeding is 

 certainly advantageous when managed with judgment and 

 discreet selection, but it has its disadvantages also, for it is 

 to be remembered that faults and blemishes are inherited as 

 well as merits, and that the faults have a way of asserting 



