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called the American English Beagle Club, 
now the American Beagle Club. By estab- 
lishing a standard and offering special 
prizes at the leading bench shows this 
organization did much to popularize the 
breed. As a result of this systematic effort 
our beagles improved much in appearance, 
and breeders began to produce hounds of a 
far more uniform type. In 1890 the 
Massachusetts beaglers banded together 
and organized the National Beagle Club, 
with the avowed intent of holding beagle 
trials. Many were the laughs that were 
raised at the pretentious start of the new 
association, but on November 4 in the same 
year they met, for a field trial, at Hyannis, 
Mass., a little town out on Cape Cod. The 
party, consisting of Bradford S. Turpin, 
O. W. Brooking, W. A. Poer, F. W. Chap- 
man, C. E. Peabody, Arthur Parry, A. R. 
Crowell, F. W. Rutter and the judges, 
Harry W. Lacy and Joe Lewis, entered into 
the sport with enthusiam, but it did not 
take them many hours to discover that the 
sand dunes of Cape Cod, covered with 
wind-twisted scrub oak and swept with 
- wild autumn winds, were no place for a 
beagle trial. Rabbits were as scarce as 
grizzlies in Wall. Street, the grounds were 
situated far from headquarters and follow- 
ing the hounds was a Titanic task. The 
whole thing resolved itself into the answer- 
‘ing of the two questions: Should the trials 
be forsaken and acknowledged a failure; or 
should the club repair to better grounds? 
Lucky it was for the future of beagle trials 
in the United States that the men of that 
party were a devoted band. Mr. Rutter 
was able to offer a solution by taking the 
entire party to Salem, N. H., where, under 
his able direction, the trials were success- 
fully held. In the face of seemingly in- 
surmountable difficulties the club held its 
first trials, and, without outside support, 
conclusively proved that beagle trials could 
be as smoothly and honestly conducted as 
similiar events for bird dogs. 
There are two distinct types of beagles 
that have been produced by local conditions. 
In thickly wooded country, where the 
hounds but drive to the gun, breeders will 
RECREATION 
ofttimes excuse crooked legs, long backs 
and short ears; their object being to produce 
superfine noses, good briar-withstanding 
coats, sound feet, music and plenty of 
muscle. To the man who hunts in the open 
comes the temptation for a dashing type of 
beagle, and poor coats, snippy noses, lack of 
music and high set ears are overlooked if 
the hound has good legs, loin, shoulders 
and back. In Maryland and other parts it 
has become the style to have the hounds 
kill the rabbits, not by slowly and surely, 
in spite of the quarry’s cunning and swift- 
ness, wearing him out, but with the quick, 
mad dash of the foxhound. 
The following summary from Lee’s 
‘““Modern Dogs” gives a very excellent 
description of the Englishman’s ideal of the 
beagle: ‘‘In appearance the beagle is a 
diminutive harrier, with’equally long and 
pendulous ears; not so level in back as the 
foxhound, but in other respects much like 
him. However, the best color is blue 
mottled, but, in addition, the ordinary 
hound markings are good, and black and 
tans are repeatedly met with and evidently 
admissible. The smooth-coated hounds are 
usually understood to be the most desirable, 
but the rough or wire-haired variety is 
admired by many persons, and in all | 
respects is equally as good as the other. In 
hunting, the beagle is a merry, keen, hard 
worker; he can make casts for himself, and 
possesses a peculiarly bright, clear, silvery 
voice. The smaller, or rabbit, beagles” (on 
this side called pocket-beagles) ‘‘are 
especially sweet in their cry and, no doubt 
on this account, obtained the name ‘singing 
beagles,’ by which they were known hun- 
dreds of years ago. In height there is much 
variety, those used for rabbits varying from 
nine inches, the standard at the late Mr. 
Crane’s, at Southover, up to, say, twelve 
inches. Others vary from twelve to sixteen 
inches, but when the latter height is 
attained there is a near approach to the 
harrier, and so the foxhound, the cross with 
the latter having been made with the idea 
of improving the legs and feet of the smaller 
hound, a change of blood that naturally 
has a tendency to do away with type.” 
