Kennel

“ Another point which must be insisted upon in relation to profitable toy breeding is the necessity for health in the kennel. I say kennel because it is a useful word, but am far from suggesting that toys of any kind should be kept in the way understood by "having a kennel" among larger dogs. The breeder who succeeds best is invariably the one who keeps one or two, or even four or five, pet bitches, running about the house enjoying full liberty and all the happiness of personal favourites, with, it may be, a dog also of the party. ”

“ Have the kennel thoroughly fumigated, and you'll have no more trouble.' At my wife's request she went into the yard to have a look at it, and the moment she bent down, she cried out like you did, 'Why, there's a dog inside—a terrier!' My wife and I both looked and could see nothing. ”

“ When he is not with you, shut him up in a kennel, big or little, made as nearly as you can have it on the model of a kennel for hounds. Let it be cool and airy in summer and snug and warm in winter; keep all clean—kennel, food, dishes, water and beds. Don't forget that different dogs have different requirements; for instance, that a long thick coated dog will [Pg 38] sleep with comfort out in the snow, while a short-coated one will shiver in a thick bed of straw. ”

“ A quiet man could not walk the highways without being elbowed into the kennel by swaggering swashbucklers, or accosted by painted hussies. Padders and michers, laced cloaks, jingling spurs, slashed boots, tall plumes, bullies and pimps, oaths and blasphemies--I promise you hell was waxing fat. ”

“ The kennel should be located in a shady spot during the summer; in winter it should be sheltered from the wind, and so placed as to enable the dog to enjoy the sunshine at will. Above all things, never chain a dog where he cannot screen himself from the sun's rays. ”

“ Then I slept soundly, and the sly sun had painted many a figure on my walls ere I waked to hear the bugle playing at the barracks, and Sir William's hounds baying in their kennels.
Dub! dub! rub-a-dub-dub! Dub! dub! rub-a-dub-dub!
The guard was changing at the block-house, while I, all shivers, dashed cold water over me from head to foot and rubbed my limbs into a tingle.
How sweetly came the matins of the robins! A kennel-lad, standing in the sunshine by the stables, wound his hunting-horn till the deep-jowled hounds drowned all with their baying. ”

“ To live on our lawn, did I say? Not much! Such wonderful creatures must have a house and grounds of their own to retire to when they were weary of using ours, or when our presence bored them. The kennel and runs were built near the carriage barn, the runs, twenty by one hundred feet, enclosed with high wire netting. The kennel, eight by sixteen, was a handsome structure of its kind, with two compartments eight by eight (for Jane spoke for the future) , and beds, benches, and the usual fixtures which well-bred dogs are supposed to require. ”

“ On the days when the sportsmen are not seeking grouse the dog is in his kennel, and the pigeon is always his close attendant. She roosts on a rack over the manger of the stable, and in the day-time is either strutting about preening her feathers, taking her meals from the dog's biscuit and water tin, or quite as often sitting in the kennel by his side, nestling close to him. ”

“ When I forced myself away from my fire before dark, and ran down to the stable to see about feeding and bedding the horses and cows, every beast had its head drawn in towards its shoulders, and looked at me with the dismal air of saying, "Who is tempering the wind now?" The dogs in the kennel, with their noses between their hind-legs, were shivering under their blankets and straw like a nest of chilled young birds. The fowls on the roost were mere white and blue puffs of feathers. Nature alone has the making of her creatures ”

“ The kennel should also be in a low house, and not in a solere (an upper chamber) , but there should be a loft above, so that it might be warmer in winter and cooler in summer, and always by night and by day I would that some child lie or be in the kennel with the hounds to keep them from fighting. Also in the kennel should be a chimney to warm the hounds when they are cold or when they are wet with rain or from passing and swimming over rivers. ”

“ I will make a kennel in the corner of the carriage-house, where he can be chained up, and yet have room to stretch himself; and the young miss can feed him, and see him as often as she likes, till matters are better settled. ”

“ Kennels, bedding, food and feeding, water, exercise, and grooming—these are the things which given proper attention mean a healthy and happy dog. Let us take them up, one at a time, for it is as often ignorance as thoughtlessness that causes the trouble.
The question as to the kind of a kennel is bound to have a variety of different answers according to whether one lives in the city or the country, in the North or the South, and whether one is to keep one dog or fifty. There are, however, certain fundamental considerations that apply to any home for dogs. ”

“ A kennel ought to be situated on an eminence, in a dry situation, and in the vicinity of a brook or running stream. The strictest cleanliness is necessary, both for promoting the health of hounds, and also to preserve their sense sufficiently acute: for this purpose, kennels should be well aired, and strewed with fresh straw, to prevent the mange, or other infectious distemper. ”

“ Nowhere any comfort or cleanliness, except that sometimes the inner kennel, of which the woman guards the key, will have its floor swept and clean matting in one corner. The court about which there are two or three of these kennels, serves the family for all purposes; there the fire for cooking is built, there are the water-jars, and the stone for grinding corn; there the chickens and the dogs are; there crouch in the dirt women and men, the women spinning, making bread, or nursing children, the men in vacant idleness. ”

“ For beagles, kennel discipline is of more avail than out-door teaching. They must be taught to come and go, when called. To such perfection is this kennel discipline carried in England, that I have seen fifty couples of hounds waiting in a yard to be fed ”

“ Here, in a comfortable airy kennel, are dogs from all parts of the world, some of them great noble fellows, who allow the little folks to fondle and stroke them. On a miniature mountain of artificial rock-work troops of goats and mouflons—a species of mountain sheep—clamber about, as much at home as if in their far-away native mountains. ”

“ Great Danes.—I suppose, at the present time, it will be generally admitted that the largest, and best, kennel of this breed is in the hands of one of the handsomest, and most graceful, of the many enthusiastic ladies interested in the kennel-world, and that one of the most charming sights at many of our largest shows is to see a team of these beautiful dogs, accompanied by their fair owner, and from the crowds of the public I have noticed outside the rings, on such occasions, I have no doubt they were appreciative spectators. ”

“ Pg 105344.—THE KENNEL PUZZLE.
A man has twenty-five dog kennels all communicating with each other by doorways, as shown in the illustration. He wishes to arrange his twenty dogs so that they shall form a knight's string from dog No. 1 to dog No. 20, the bottom row of five kennels to be left empty, as at present. ”

“ All day, he has taken no food; but has shown an evident desire for water—lapping it up, greedily. I was relieved to observe this.
The evening has come, and I am in my study. I intend to follow my plan of last night, and watch the kennel. The door, leading into the garden, is bolted, securely. I am consciously glad there are bars to the windows....
Night:—Midnight has gone. The dog has been silent, up to the present. Through the side window, on my left, I can make out, dimly, the outlines of the kennel. For the first time, the dog moves, and I hear the rattle of his chain. I look out, quickly. ”

“ He is kept hungry, in some degree, all the time, to make [67] him more ferocious. He looks hollow and gaunt. There is a pan upon the ground, from which his master feeds him, but he has eaten up all that it contained, and he wants more. This makes him watchful. If he had eaten too much, he would probably now be lying asleep in his kennel. The kennel is a small house, with a door in front, where the dog goes in and out. There is straw upon the floor of the kennel. The dog was lying down upon the floor of his kennel, when he thought he heard a noise. ”

“ I wash the whole kennel every week. His bed is made of pine shavings, and in cold weather I put in a pile of them, so that he can have a blanket as well as a bed. The kennel is raised on blocks, so that it will not be damp, and there is a platform in front of it for hot nights. When it is chilly, I hang a piece of old carpet over the door, and on very cold nights he sleeps on his own rug in the laundry. He is a big, strong dog, and he doesn't like too warm a room to sleep in. ”

“ Sometimes they would give entertainments in honour of their dogs, when all the animals of all the guests (there seemed to be a whole kennel of them) would be dressed up in coats of silk and satin with pockets and pocket-handkerchiefs, and then led downstairs to the drawing-room, where Alma's wheezy spaniel and my husband's peevish terrier were supposed to receive them. ”

“ Where half a dozen dogs are kept, I think a kennel about 20 feet long, nine feet wide, with a pitched roof, nine feet high in the front, and at the back seven feet, with a southern exposure, with good windows that open top and bottom, and a good tight board floor will do admirably. ”

“ To those people who live in the city, or where a kennel can not be established for want of adequate room to give the dogs the necessary exercise, an excellent plan to follow is one adopted by an acquaintance of mine, and followed by him for a number of years with a good measure of success. ”

“ The change of food and general conditions of living on first coming into kennel is always a trying period for puppies, and any inherent weakness in their constitution is likely to make itself manifest then. I should be interested to know how the proportion of hounds received back into kennels from puppy walkers compares with the experiences of breeders of other classes of hounds or dogs, such as greyhounds, sporting dogs, or even terriers. ”

“ Generally speaking, none but the sportsman can form an adequate conception of the perfect obedience of the hound both in the kennel and the field. At feeding-time, each dog, although hungry enough, will go through the gate in the precise order in which he is called by the feeder; and, in a well-broken pack, to chop at, or to follow a hare, or to give tongue on a false scent, or even to break cover alone, although the fox is in view, are faults that are rarely witnessed. ”

“ As we were very poor, we were forced to live in a wretched kennel in the dampest part of the town, among dogs no better off than ourselves. The place we occupied overhung the water, and one day when the old doggess was punishing me for something I had done, the corner in which I was crouched being rotten, gave way, and I fell plump into the river. ”

“ For the kennels of our British-bred dogs, perhaps a southern or a south-western aspect is the best, but wherever it is placed the kennel must be sufficiently sheltered from rain and wind, and it ought to be provided with a covered run in which the inmates may have full liberty. An awning of some kind is necessary. Trees afford good shelter from the sun-rays, but they harbour moisture, and damp must be avoided at all costs. ”

“ In the beginning of September, when the frequent rain made things very moist and uncomfortable in the kennel and on deck, we built a kennel out on the ice with a tarpaulin roof and a floor of planks, with plenty of shavings spread over them. While it was being built we let the whole pack of dogs out upon the ice; but after playing for half an hour the puppies, one after another, began to have convulsions. ”

“ As when their lap is finished, the cautious huntsman to their kennel gathers the nimble- footed hounds, they with lank ears and tails slouch sullenly on, whilst he, with his whippers-in, follows close at their heels, regardless of their dogged humour, till, having seen them safe within the door, he turns the key, and then retires to whatever business or pleasure calls him thence ”

“ The puppy that is free from worms starts life with a great advantage.
CHAPTER LI SOME COMMON AILMENTS OF THE DOG AND THEIR TREATMENT The experienced dog-owner has long ago realised that cleanliness, wholesome food, judicious exercise and a dry, comfortable and well-ventilated kennel are the surest safeguards of health, and that attention to these necessaries saves him an infinitude of trouble and anxiety by protecting his dogs from disease. ”

“ The kennel owner, turning now to him, will, I take it for granted, read all he can lay his hands on that treats of the Airedale, go to shows, visit kennels, and talk, think, and dream Airedale. If he is to have a small kennel I advise his buying one or two good young bitches. Puppies are a chance and old bitches, however famous, are poor breeding stock. Buy young winning bitches, proved mothers and of desirable blood lines and you will have the best possible start along the road of kennel success. ”

“ Through one or more of the streets there runs a swift, clear little stream, which, being close to the pavement, and bordered with stone, may be called, I suppose, a kennel, though possessing the transparent purity of a rustic rivulet. ”

“ Next to the choice of a proper spot for, and a judicious as well as a convenient structure of the kennel, the management of the hounds, when there, becomes a matter of serious consideration, and requires a feeder of strict sobriety, indefatigable industry, invariable punctuality, great humanity, personal fidelity to his employer, and a constant attention to the business in which he is engaged, as upon him in a great degree depends the health and preservation of the hounds. ”