Terrier

“ They are of all colors, but are generally uniform in their color, whatever it be. Another kind, still, is the smooth terrier, of the same sizes as the last; a very pretty dog indeed; with a kinder disposition to mankind; yet equally destructive to vermin, and watchful to the premises which they inhabit, or of whatever else is put under their charge. The fidelity of the terrier to his master is wonderful; equal, if not superior to any other dog whatever. In courage and perseverance, in hardihood, and feats of daring, he has hardly an equal ”

“ In my youth, when following the hounds, I have been delighted in witnessing the energy of a brace of terriers, who were sure to make their appearance at the slightest check, running with an ardour quite extraordinary, and incessant in their exertions to be with the busiest of the pack in their endeavours to find. If the fox takes to earth, the little brave terrier eagerly follows, and shows by his baying whether the fox lays deep or not, so that those who are employed in digging it out can act accordingly. ”

“ 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. ”

“ The genuine and lesser breed of terrier is employed in a business, to which, by his size, his fortitude, persevering strength, and invincible ardour, he seems more peculiarly adapted, and may be most truly said "to labour cheerfully in his vocation." This is, in his subordinate attendance upon the chase, where, like distinguished personages in a procession, though last, he is not the least in consequence. ”

“ That terrier was a little dog, but still he was of much use, not only by killing rats, which was his regular duty, but by trying to find out what his master wanted to have done, and doing it.
Little boys and girls may be of still greater use, if they will both perform their regular duties, and try to find out what there is to be done, and then, like the terrier, do it. ”

“ We'll have as many as we want; there'll be an Irish setter, soft-eyed and chestnut-coated, the perfect gentleman among dogs; there'll be a bull terrier, bright and loving; there'll be a collie, wisest and most observing, and, possibly, a toy dog, for your plaything at times, when you are tired of me. ”

“ When this little terrier has marked a rabbit or a rat in a patch of grass or brambles, her common sense tells her that if she dives in after her quarry it may dash out unseen by her, by reason of the grass or brambles. So she stands by, and stamps, and otherwise tries to make her game bolt, in a way which will allow her to see the direction; and she is seldom baffled. It is difficult to decide whether this terrier is more or less reasonable than her kennel companion, a retriever, when feeding-time comes. ”

“ CHAPTER XXXIX THE WEST HIGHLAND WHITE TERRIER Man, being a hunting animal, kills the otter for his skin, and the badger also; the fox he kills because the animal likes lamb and game to eat. Man, being unable to deal in the course of a morning with the rocks under and between which his quarry harbours, makes use of the small dog which will go underground, to which the French name terrier has been attached. ”

“ We again saw numbers of young ones, not much larger than terrier dogs, sitting on the necks of their dams, the little saucy-looking heads cocking up between the old one's ears; as they become a little older they sit on the withers. ”

“ Imagine my astonishment when, on making our customary bi-weekly trek next day, I discovered the small terrier secured to our tool-limber by a piece of baling-wire, evidently enjoying the trip and abusing the limber-mules as if he had known them all his life. Since he had insisted on coming with us there was nothing further to be said, so we christened him "The O'Murphy," attached him to the strength for rations and discipline, and for two years he has shared our joys and sorrows, our billets and bully-beef, up and down the land of Somewheres. ”

“ Always, depending on the moment's mood, he was either terrier or spaniel, the snap and scrap and perk of the one alternating with the gentle snuggling indolence of the other.
As terrier he would dig furiously by the hour after a field mouse; as spaniel he would "read" the breeze with the best nose among the dog folk of our neighborhood, or follow a trail quite well. I know there was retrieving blood. A year ago May he caught and brought me, not doing the least injury, an oriole that probably had flown against a wire and was struggling disabled in the grass. ”

“ The lid was suddenly flung open, their eyes were dazzled by the blaze of an upheld lantern, and, before they could [Pg 26] realize their position, a terrier was amongst them, dealing out scientific murder. Fortunately, he, with one companion, had been where the corn was highest, and a frantic scramble had landed them over the edge of the bin and down behind it. But, from where he lay, he could hear plainly enough what was happening. The mice were leaping in every direction against the polished sides of the bin, missing their footing and falling back into the terrier’s mouth. ”

“ The fact remains the dog is a terrier—a sort of glorified edition of what we understand by the word, it is true, but in points, looks, and character, a terrier nevertheless, and it is impossible otherwise to classify him.
People will ask: "How can he be a terrier? Why he is an outrage on the very word, which can only mean a dog to go to ground; and to what animal in the country of his birth can an Airedale go to ground?" Above ground and in water, however, an Airedale can, and does, perform in a very excellent manner everything that any other terrier can do. ”

“ The terrier would start a hare, and chase it up the hill towards the large wood at the summit, where they arrived somewhat tired. At this point, the large dog, who was fresh and had rested after his walk, darted after the animal, which he usually captured. They then ate the hare between them and returned home. ”

“ Now the state of the Abbot was very like to that of a terrier dog which, being accustomed to worry and torment a certain ewe-sheep, comes upon the same after it has lambed and finds a new creature—one that, instead of running in affright, turns upon it and, with head and hood and all its weight of mutton, butts, and leaps, and tramples. ”

“ The West Highland Terrier of the old sort—I do not, of course, speak of bench dogs—earned their living following fox, badger, or otter wherever these went underground, between, over, or under rocks that no man could get at to move, and some of such size that a hundred men could not move them. ”

“ When doggy men beyond ocean talk about a terrier, they usually pronounce it tarrier, and not terrier, as we mostly call him on this bank of the Atlantic. There is no authority for the former pronunciation, that I know of, beyond usage, which, however, is much taken as a standard in England. Thus, an English merchant will talk to you about his clarks, an American about his clurks. The French word terrier—derived, of course, from terre—signifies not only the dog, but a burrow in the earth ”

“ He was a man of about fifty years of age, tall, straight, bony and angular, with a square, pale face, light gray eyes, and scanty dark hair, brushed from either ear across a bald crown, and thus imparting to his physiognomy some faint resemblance to that of a terrier—a sharp, uncompromising, hard-headed terrier—a terrier not to be taken in by the cleverest dog-stealer who ever distinguished himself in his profession. ”

“ He will play with the children, and share their sports as joyfully as a dumb creature can do; and nothing can be more affectionate, kind, and gentle among them. He is cleanly, honest, and seldom addicted to tricks of any kind.
We prefer the high-bred, smooth, English terrier, to any other variety. They are rather more gentle in temper, and very much handsomer in appearance, than the rough-haired kind ”

“ Hartshorn. "There are nearly a hundred recognized breeds of dogs in this country, all different, and eighteen of these are terriers. To make them easier to remember, I will divide them into three classes, smooth-coated, wire-haired, and long-haired. The smooths are the bull terrier, the Boston, the smooth fox terrier, the Manchester, and the Doberman pinscher. The wires are the wire-haired fox terrier, the Airedale, the Bedlington, the Irish, the Welsh, the Scottish, the West Highland white, the Dandie Dinmont, the cairn, and the Sealyham. ”

“ The terrier holds his own against beasts fifteen times as large as himself; no matter how cruelly his adversary may tear him, he dies without a groan. Few of the domesticated breeds possess courage and contempt of pain in so high a degree. ”

“ It is a physiological peculiarity which leads the Greyhound to chase its prey by sight,—that enables the Beagle to track it by the scent,—that impels the Terrier to its rat-hunting propensity,—and that leads the Retriever to its habit of retrieving. ”

“ The ordinary dull-nosed dog goes past a wainscoting and never suspects a thing; then your terrier comes along and he takes one whiff at the bottom of that baseboard and immediately starts pawing for his prey. ”

“ The Pointer, the Retriever, Bulldog, and the Terrier, differ very greatly, and yet there is every reason to believe that every one of these races has arisen from the same source,—that all the most important races have arisen by this selective breeding from accidental variation. ”

“ The terrier is usually below the medium size, but sometimes fully comes up to or even exceeds it. He is smooth-haired or rough according to the breed, of which there are several, each claiming to be equally pure. Besides his capacity for the destruction of small game, his innate love for the sport renders him a valuable assistant in keeping off vagrant cattle from the premises ”

“ A DOG that's fit for anything, badger or fox, rats or rabbits, the Fox Terrier is of universal distribution. We meet him on the show bench, spruce and well groomed, exchanging wordy warfare with his neighbour; running with the hounds, ready for any work that may chance, or at his master's feet in the smoking room when the doings of the day are recounted---no matter where he may be, he will make himself at home, in cottage or in hall, so long as there is sport afoot in the daytime, and a dry bed to lie upon at nights. ”

“ A small terrier used to start a rabbit nearly every morning, at the end of the shrubbery next the house, and hunt him through the whole length of it to the other end, where the rabbit escaped into an old drain. ”

“ But the collie is a gentleman. He has risen from the ranks, to be sure, but he is every inch the gentleman, and just now I am speaking of dogs. The terrier is every inch a dog, and the Irish is the terrier par excellence. ”

“ Many of them, I recall, are stories of dogs that found their way home over unknown roads after being carried away for long distances. This homing instinct seems to be very strong in the terrier. The breed has always been a very close and intimate companion of man, and that has sharpened his wits and deepened his sympathies. ”

“ In rabbit-shooting in thick furze or breaks, the terrier, as I have often witnessed, will take covert with the eagerness and impetuosity of a foxhound. On one of these occasions I saw an enormous wild cat started, which a small terrier pursued and never quitted, notwithstanding the unequal contest, till it was shot by a keeper. As vermin-killers, they are superior to all other dogs. ”

“ The dog which is a genus, ranked in the world of letters as the genus canis, has his specific divisions, as hound, bull, cur, terrier, and the like—each marked by a peculiarity designating its kind. These may be cultivated, but never changed or overcome. The dog that runs by scent may be cultivated in his powers—may be taught to scent closer and to increase his speed; so, too, may he that runs by sight be improved in the same manner; but neither one can be transformed into the other, for the specific division must continue to the end of time. ”

“ They are the “Old Man’s,” but they follow the Mate up and down until they drop with fatigue. Black silky spaniel, rough-red Irish terrier, black and grey badger-toed Scotch half-breed, nameless mongrel—they all love the Mate. ”

“ The enthusiastic sportsman who fears neither storms nor sunstroke (coup de soleil) makes his appearance at the Riverside without either fishing rod, lines, worms, flies or bait, of any description, but having under his left arm a double-barrelled gun, in his right hand, a large cabbage and following at his heels a clever Poodle or Terrier dog. ”

“ There are several features that are characteristic of the dog that tend to its universal popularity—its attractive shape, style and size, its winning disposition, and its beautiful color and markings. From the bulldog he inherits a sweet, charming personality, quiet, restful demeanor, and an intense love of his master and home. He does not possess the restless, roving disposition which characterizes so many members of the terrier tribe, nor will he be found quarreling with other dogs. ”

“ The general-purpose terrier develops grave faults. If a rabbit or a hare is started, he prefers giving chase to going on with the rat business: he attacks ferrets as well as rats, and he prevents rats from bolting by jumping about over the burrows and poking his nose into them too freely. A terrier must be taught to restrain himself until a rat has bolted. The keeper holds him down, cuffs and rates him soundly each time he tries to go too soon, but gives lavish praise if he waits until the right moment. ”