Exhibition Dogs . 59 
Watch the judge, and when his back is turned or he has put you in the corner. 
after a satisfactory inspection of your dog, let doggy be at ease. If you are 
not yet picked out for a mark of some kind, never lose track of the judge. 
As his eye travels your way, have your dog ready in his best possible pose, 
standing square on his legs, not struggling to get at other dogs, or back on 
his haunches looking up at you too much. That looks all right to you, per- 
haps, but the judge may have him all out of shape from his point of view. 
Many make the mistake of trying to show dogs of one breed as they do 
of another breed, whereas there are certain characteristics pertaining to 
each variety which should not be overlooked. In St. Bernards, mastiffs, 
greyhounds, hounds, setters and pointers you want no particular keenness 
in expression, and the elevation or lifting of the ears is a detraction in the 
case of the first two breeds, the look of size in skull and dignity in expression 
being lost. In setters, pointers and hounds, the shape of the skull is spoilt 
by ears too high on the head, they being required, in their cases, to hang 
well down and close to the side of the head; in greyhounds and wolfhounds 
the symmetry is spoilt very much by a pricked or lifted ear, even admitting 
that the Russian fanciers speak of the horse’s ear as proper. Nothing that 
detracts from appearance can be beneficial—even if for fancy’s sake some 
call it proper. 7 
Terriers, prick-eared and cropped-eared dogs call for a keen or a smart 
look, and should have all encouragement to hold their ears well up if pricked 
or cropped, and smartly and with a keen look of the eyes in the case of 
natural-eared terriers. So also with the collie and his semi-erect ear when 
at attention. It is usual to get the collie to “throw his ears” by throwing 
something on the ground a short distance in front of him, but this calls for 
judgment. Some dogs carry a rather high ear, and in such a case do not 
throw too far ahead, but so that the dog will look rather more down in front 
than ahead. Of course, in the case of ears not quite high enough, have the 
dog look up slightly if possible, or well ahead. In spaniels the one great char- 
acteristic is a tail carried down, yet it is very common to see even spaniel men 
of prominence holding their spaniel’s tail slightly elevated instead of leaving 
it alone. Some foolish showers will, in the case of a spaniel short of lip, keep 
drawing the attention of the judge to this defect by pulling the lip down and 
holding it so. Such a course is merely saying to the judge that the dog is 
defective there. 
The less one handles a dog in the ring the better, as a rule, but some 
