SILVER TABBY PERSIANS. 



169 



WINTER QUARTERS A']' DIXGI.KY HILL. 

 (Photo: Cassell & Company, Limited.) 



making a speciality of silver tabbies, and the 

 Hon. P. Wodehouse possesses a fine silver 

 tabby female in " Silver Saint." Mrs. 

 Slingsby owns " Don Pedro," a beautiful 

 specimen, and Miss Meeson has bred some 

 good silver tabbies as well as silvers. But 

 the ranks need filling, and with the assist- 

 ance of the society now in existence the 

 classification at shows will become more 

 liberal, and instead of silvers and browns being 

 often placed together at our smaller shows, 

 separate classes are guaranteed, for it is cer- 

 tainly most unfair on judge and exhibitor to 

 place these two very distinct breeds together. 

 " Comparisons are odious," we are told, and 

 certainly it is hard on the brownies for the 

 more brilliant silvers to be placed side by side 

 in competition. As regards the mating of 

 silver tabbies, the essential point to try and 

 breed for is markings, and it behoves the fancier 

 to endeavour to find a sire with bold, dis- 

 tinct tabby markings, and if it is desired to 

 strengthen the colour, then a black is not at 

 all a bad cross. There are two distinct kinds 



of tabbies the blotched and the pencilled 

 varieties ; and it is a matter of choice which is 

 considered the handsomest. But it does not do 

 to mate these two varieties together. A well- 

 known authority on breeding silver tabbies 

 writes thus in Fur and Feather: "A great 

 deal has been said as to the disadvantage of 

 crossing chinchillas with silver tabbies, but 

 we think this applies more to the detriment 

 of chinchillas than of tabbies. Provided the 

 tabby, on one side, is of a very decided type, 

 the chinchilla, having come originally from 

 the same stock, may not prove a bad cross. 

 Miss Cope's ' Silver Tangle,' for instance, 

 one of the best-marked silver tabby queens, 

 is the child of the chinchilla ' Silver Chieftain,' 

 and of a queen bred from a silver tabby sire. 

 A good young queen, belonging to Mr. Hoddi- 

 nott, was bred from ' Lord Argent ' and a 

 tabby mother. ' Champion Felix ' was bred 

 from ' Topso,' a heavily marked tabby, and 

 ' Lady Pink,' a cat that would nowadays have 

 been called a light shaded silver with white 



