544 
dona, the Hon. R. C. Hill (afterwards 
Viscount Hill), Mr. J. H. Dawes, Mr. C. W. 
Hodge, and Mr. F. Adcock. 
From the very beginning His Majesty 
the King (then Prince of Wales) took the 
warmest interest in the Club’s welfare, and 
became its patron in the first year of its 
existence. From that time until the present, 
the Kennel Club has continued to receive 
many marks of royal favour. On his acces- 
sion to the throne His Majesty signified his 
gracious intention to continue his patronage, 
and on the death of Mr. Shirley in 1904 
His Royal Highness the Duke of Connaught 
was elected by acclamation to the vacant 
presidentship of the club, a position which 
he was pleased to accept. 
At its foundation the membership of 
the club was limited to one hundred, but 
later it was decided that the number of 
members should not exceed three hundred, 
and this rule remains unaltered to the 
present time. 
The first business of the newly formed 
club was to draw up a code of rules for the 
guidance of dog shows, and a further code 
for the guidance of field trials of sporting 
dogs. The former were ten in number, 
and the latter eleven. Both these codes 
now appear crude and archaic. To take 
two instances from the ‘“‘ Rules for Dog 
Shows.” One enacted that if a dog were 
entered without being clearly identified, 
it should forfeit any prize which had been 
awarded to it, and that if the omission were 
detected in time the dog should not be 
allowed to compete. In the other rule, the 
need of strict veterinary inspection was not 
insisted upon, and only where the total 
entry of dogs amounted to two hundred was 
it considered essential that a duly appointed 
veterinary inspector should be in attend- 
ance. It appears remarkable, now that 
strict veterinary inspection is a sine qud non, 
to find that, perhaps by inadvertence, this 
tule was the next year omitted altogether. 
It did, however, appear again in 1876, but 
was again omitted for a number of years, 
and although the presence of a veterinary 
inspector was implied, no rule existed pro- 
viding for his compulsory appointment. 
THE NEW BOOK OF THE DOG. 
In the year 1879 a thorough revision of 
both the show and field trial rules had 
become a pressing necessity, and sub- 
committees were appointed to undertake 
this revision. When the new show rules 
came into force in 1880, their number had 
been augmented to fifteen. Two of these 
new rules were of far-reaching importance. 
The first made provision for the registration 
of dogs; the other imposed penalties upon 
persons guilty of fraudulent or discreditable 
conduct. Such offences were now for the 
first time taken cognisance of in the rules, 
although the committee had on many oc- 
casions previously dealt with such charges, 
when complaints had been laid before them. 
The rules for field trials, which, when 
first framed in 1874, numbered eleven, 
were by the revision of 1879 increased to 
thirty-one, the old rules having been found 
totally inadequate to the purpose for which 
they had been originally framed, owing to 
the increasing popularity and importance 
of these meetings. 
Since 1880 the rules have been many 
times revised, and have received many 
additions as occasion has arisen, and scarcely 
a general meeting of the members takes 
place without some needed amendment or 
addition being made to the code. 
After formulating codes of rules, the 
earliest undertaking of the newly-formed 
club was the compilation of a Stud Book. 
In arranging for the preparation of this 
book, Mr. Shirley consulted the late Mr. 
Walsh, at that time editor of The Field. 
That gentleman strongly recommended that 
Mr. Frank C. S. Pearce should be entrusted 
with this important task, and he was ulti- 
mately selected for the office. Mr. F.C. S. 
Pearce was the son of the Rev. Thomas 
Pearce, a well-known writer on sporting 
and canine subjects, who, under the nom de 
guerre of “Idstone,” was a popular and 
regular contributor to the columns of The 
Field, and the author of an excellent treatise 
on “The Dog.” The selection was in 
every respect an excellent one, the work 
was commenced forthwith, and the first 
volume of the Kennel Club Calendar and 
Stud Book was published in December, 
