Of late years Toy Bull-terriers have fallen in popularity. This is a pity, as their lilliputian self-assertion is most amusing. As pets they are most affectionate, excellent as watch-dogs, clever at acquiring tricks, and always cheerful and companionable. They have good noses and will hunt diligently; but wet weather or thick undergrowth will deter them, and they are too small to do serious harm to the best stocked game preserve.
The most valuable Toy Bull-terriers are small and very light in weight, and these small dogs usually have "apple-heads." Pony Queen, the former property of Sir Raymond Tyrwhitt Wilson, weighed under 3 lb., but the breed remains "toy" up to 15 lb. When you get a dog with a long wedge-shaped head, the latter in competition with small "apple-headed" dogs always takes the prize, and a slightly contradictory state of affairs arises from the fact that the small dog with an imperfectly shaped head will sell for more money than a dog with a perfectly shaped head which is larger.
In drawing up a show schedule of classes for this breed it is perhaps better to limit the weight of competitors to 12 lb. The Bull-terrier Club put 15 lb. as the lowest weight allowed for the large breed, and it seems a pity to have an interregnum between the large and miniature variety; still, in the interests of the small valuable specimens, this seems inevitable, and opportunist principles must be applied to doggy matters as to other business in this world. At present there is a diversity of opinion as to their points, but roughly they are a long flat head, wide between the eyes and tapering to the nose, which should be black. Ears erect and bat-like, straight legs and rather distinctive feet; some people say these are cat-like.
Toy Bull-terriers ought to have an alert, gay appearance, coupled with refinement, which requires a nice whip tail. The best colour is pure white. A brindle spot is not amiss, and even a brindle dog is admissible, but black marks are wrong. The coat ought to be close and stiff to the touch. Toy Bull-terriers are not delicate as a rule. They require warmth and plenty of exercise in all weathers.
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The most elegant, graceful, and refined of all dogs are the tiny Italian Greyhounds. Their exquisitely delicate lines, their supple movements and beautiful attitudes, their soft large eyes, their charming colouring, their gentle and loving nature, and their scrupulous cleanliness of habit—all these qualities justify the admiration bestowed upon them as drawing-room pets. They are fragile, it is true—fragile as eggshell china—not to be handled roughly. But their constitution is not necessarily delicate, and many have been known to live to extreme old age. Miss Mackenzie's Jack, one of the most beautiful of the breed ever known, lived to see his seventeenth birthday, and even then was strong and healthy. Their fragility is more apparent than real, and if they are not exposed to cold or damp, they require less pampering than they usually receive. This cause has been a frequent source of constitutional weakness, and it was deplorably a fault in the Italian Greyhounds of half a century ago.
One cannot be quite certain as to the derivation of the Italian Greyhound. Its physical appearance naturally suggests a descent from the Gazehound of the ancients, with the added conjecture that it was purposely dwarfed for the convenience of being nursed in the lap. Greek art presents many examples of a very small dog of Greyhound type, and there is a probability that the diminutive breed was a familiar ornament in the atrium of most Roman villas. In Pompeii a dwarfed Greyhound was certainly kept as a domestic pet, and there is therefore some justification for the belief that the Italian prefix is not misplaced.
In very early times the Italian Greyhound was appreciated. Vandyck, Kneller, and Watteau frequently introduced the graceful figures of these dogs as accessories in their portraits of the Court beauties of their times, and many such portraits may be noticed in the galleries of Windsor Castle and Hampton Court. Mary, Queen of Scots is supposed to have been fond of the breed, as more surely were Charles I. and Queen Anne. Some of the best of their kind were in the possession of Queen Victoria at Windsor and Balmoral, where Sir Edwin Landseer transferred their graceful forms to canvas.
Among the more prominent owners of the present time are the Baroness Campbell von Laurentz, whose Rosemead Laura and Una are of superlative merit alike in outline, colour, style, length of head, and grace of action; Mrs. Florence Scarlett, whose Svelta, Saltarello, and Sola are almost equally perfect; Mrs. Matthews, the owner of Ch. Signor, our smallest and most elegant show dog; and Mr. Charlwood, who has exhibited many admirable specimens, among them Sussex Queen and Sussex Princess.
The Italian Greyhound Club of England has drawn up the following standard and scale of points:—