"Ye—es, to be sure. May I see him on the scale?"
So Jan was carefully weighed by the judge himself, and scaled one hundred and forty-eight and one-half pounds. And then he was carefully measured for height—at the shoulder-bone—and touched the standard at a fraction over thirty-two and one-half inches.
"Re—markable," said the judge; "especially in the weight. He certainly is finely proportioned. Would you mind just running him across the ring as quickly as you can?"
The owners of the other three dogs wore during this time an expression of inhuman selflessness of superhumanly kind interest in Jan and his doings.
"It's a thousand pities he's so very coarse," murmured one disinterested admirer, the owner of the Welsh terrier. A moment later the Master had to hide a smile as he heard the owner of the bulldog whisper: "Nice beast. Pity he's so weedy. A little less on the fine side and one could back him as a winner."
To run well while on the lead is an accomplishment rare among large dogs, and one which demands careful training. So the Master took chances. He signaled Betty to call Jan to her, and then loosed Jan's lead. This was a signal of delight for Jan. He was tired of the judging now and thought this ended it. Not only did he canter very springily across the ring, but he cleared the four-foot barricade as though it had not been there and greeted Betty with effusion. A moment later, at her urgent behest, and in response to the Master's call, he returned as easily to the ring. Then the judge, thoughtfully tapping his note-book with his pencil, bowed to the exhibitors, and said:
"Thank you, gentlemen; I think that will do."
The order of the awards was:
| No. 214 | 1 |
| No. 23 | 2 |
| No. 97 | 3 |
| No. 116 | H.C. |
which meant that the Welshman was highly commended—and deserved it—the Moor took third prize, the bulldog second prize, and Jan, the son of Finn and Desdemona, first prize. And so, in the only show-ring test to which he had been submitted, Jan did every credit to both the noble strains represented in his ancestry. Finn was never beaten. The Lady Desdemona had never lowered her flag to any bloodhound. Jan had passed his first test at the head of the list, among twenty-seven competitors, and despite his judge's special predilection for terriers and bulldogs.