i6o 



CHAPTER XV. 

 THE IRISH W O L F H O U N D . 



BY FRKD"" GRESIIAM. 



" An eye of sloe, with ear not low, 

 With horse's breast, with depth of chest, 

 With breadth of loin, and curve in groin. 

 And nape set far behind the head — 

 Such xt'cre the dogs that Fin gal bred." 



— Translated from the Irish. 



IT is now some eight and twenty years 

 sinee an important contro\-ersy was 

 carried on in the coUmms of The Live 

 Stock Journal on the natnre and Iiistory of 

 the great Irish \\'()lfli(innd. Tlie chief dis- 



THE IRISH WOLFHOUND (1803). 



From " The Spoitsm.ini Calnnct:- Uy P. Rcviagle, K.A. 



putants in the discussion were Captain (i. A. 

 Graham, of Dursley, Mr. G. \V. Hickman, Mr. 

 F. Adcock, and the Rev. M. B. M'ynn. and 

 the main point at issue was whether the dog 

 then imperfectly known as tlie Irish Wolf- 



dog was a true descendant of the ancient 

 Caiiis graiits Hibcrnicus. or whether it was 

 a mere manufactured mongrel, owing its 

 origin to an admixture of the (ireat Dane 

 and the dog of the Pyrenees, modified and 

 brought to type by a 

 cross with the Highland 

 Deerhound. It was not 

 doubted — indeed, his- 

 tory and tradition 

 clearly attested — that 

 there had existed in 

 early times in Ireland 

 a \-ery large and rugged 

 hound of Greyhound 

 form, whose vocation it 

 was to hunt the wolf, 

 the red deer, and the 

 lo.\. It was assuredly 

 known to the Romans, 

 and there can be little 

 doubt that the huge 

 dog Samr, which Jarl 

 Gunnar got from the 

 Irish king ]\Iyrkiarton 

 in the tenth century 

 and took back with 

 him to Norway, wa> 

 one of this breed. But 

 it was supposed by 

 many to have become 

 extinct soon after tht- 

 disappearance of the last wolf in Ireland, 

 and it was the endeavour of Captain Graham 

 to demonstrate that specimens, although 

 admittedly degenerate, were still to be 

 found, and that they were capable of being 



