CHAPTER LIII 



The Basset 



HE French short-legged hound which in England has the 

 compound name basset-hound has never been popular in 

 America. Why there should be the addition of " hound " to 

 the name is not easy to understand for in its native country 

 it has always been simply the basset. The late Everett 

 Millais was the first to introduce the dog in England and wrote the descrip- 

 tion of the breed for Shaw's "Book of the Dog." So far as it went his de- 

 scription was good enough, but he made no attempt to go into old history. 

 BufFon describes it and names two varieties, which were the crooked and the 

 straight-legged types. But Millais makes the mistake of saying that the 

 latter were the petit chiens courant, or small running hound. The proba- 

 bility is that these dogs were descendants from the old breed of greffiers, the 

 dogs bred from the white St. Hubert hounds and the hound from Italy, or 

 else from the St. Hubert hounds direct. These were dogs used on the Ham 

 and it is easy to understand that a dog which held its nose low to the ground 

 by reason of its short legs would be preferred to one which had to make an 

 effort to get his nose as low. We are very much of the opinion that the basset 

 is the dog most entitled to be considered a direct descendant of the dogs which 

 the Abbots of St. Hubert had to contribute annually to the king's kennels 

 and which were used mainly for tracking on the Ham. Buffon and other old 

 French authorities held that the crooked legs were the result of rickets. In 

 the " Dictionairre d'Historie Naturelle " it was stated that the crooked-legged 

 variety were esteemed the best and that this originated in a malady similar to 

 "rachitis" which was transmitted as a deformity to their descendants. It 

 was finally held to be indicative of purity as we find in "La Chasse au Tir," 

 Paris, 1827: — 



"Deux Bassets bien dresses, Medor avec Brissant 



Leur baroque structure 



Vous announce dejk qu'ils sont de race pure." 



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