The Wire-hair Fox-terrier

The wire-hair Fox-terrier is, with the exception of its coat,

identical with the smooth Fox-terrier--full brother in fact to him.

The two varieties are much interbred, and several litters in

consequence include representatives of both; and not only this, but

it is quite a frequent occurrence to get a smooth puppy from wire-hair

parents, although for some generations neither of the parents may

have had any smooth cross n their pedigrees.



The North of England and South Wales (to a lesser extent) have ever

been the home of the wire-hair, and nearly all the best specimens

have come originally from one or the other of those districts. There

is no doubt that there was excellent stock in both places, and there

is also no doubt that though at times this was used to the best

advantage, there was a good deal of carelessness in mating, and a

certain amount in recording the parentage of some of the terriers.

With regard to this latter point it is said that one gentleman who

had quite a large kennel and several stud dogs, but who kept no books,

used never to bother about remembering which particular dog he had

put to a certain bitch, but generally satisfied himself as to the

sire of a puppy when it came in from walk by just examining it and

saying Oh, that pup must be by owd Jock or Jim, as the case might

be, 'cos he's so loike 'im, and down he would go on the entry form

accordingly. However this may be, there is no doubt that the sire

would be a wire-hair Fox-terrier, and, although the pedigree therefore

may not have been quite right, the terrier was invariably pure bred.



In the early days the smooth was not crossed with the wire to anything

like the extent that it was later, and this fact is probably the cause

of the salvation of the variety. The wire-hair has had more harm done

to him by his being injudiciously crossed with the smooth than

probably by anything else.



The greatest care must be exercised in the matter of coat before any

such cross is effected. The smooth that is crossed with the wire must

have a really hard, and not too full coat, and, as there are very,

very few smooths now being shown with anything like a proper coat

for a terrier to possess, the very greatest caution is necessary.

Some few years back, almost incalculable harm was done to the variety

by a considerable amount of crossing into a strain of smooths with

terribly soft flannelly coats. Good-looking terriers were produced,

and therein lay the danger, but their coats were as bad as bad could

be; and, though people were at first too prone to look over this very

serious fault, they now seem to have recovered their senses, and thus,

although much harm was done, any serious damage has been averted.

If a person has a full-coated wire-hair bitch he is too apt to put

her to a smooth simply because it is a smooth, whom he thinks will

neutralise the length of his bitch's jacket, but this is absolute

heresy, and must not be done unless the smooth has the very hardest

of hair on him. If it is done, the result is too horrible for words:

you get an elongated, smooth, full coat as soft as cotton wool, and

sometimes as silkily wavy as a lady's hair. This is not a coat for

any terrier to possess, and it is not a wire-hair terrier's coat,

which ought to be a hard, crinkly, peculiar-looking broken coat on

top, with a dense undercoat underneath, and must never be mistakable

for an elongated smooth terrier's coat, which can never at any time

be a protection from wind, water, or dirt, and is, in reality, the

reverse.



The wire-hair has had a great advertisement, for better or worse,

in the extraordinarily prominent way he has been mentioned in

connection with faking and trimming. Columns have been written on

this subject, speeches of inordinate length have been delivered,

motions and resolutions have been carried, rules have been

promulgated, etc., etc., and the one dog mentioned throughout in

connection with all of them has been our poor old, much maligned

wire-hair. He has been the scapegoat, the subject of all this

brilliancy and eloquence, and were he capable of understanding the

language of the human, we may feel sure much amusement would be his.



There are several breeds that are more trimmed than the wire-hair,

and that might well be quoted before him in this connection. There

is a vast difference between legitimate trimming, and what is called

faking. All dogs with long or wire-hair or rough coats naturally

require more attention, and more grooming than those with short smooth

coats. For the purposes of health and cleanliness it is absolutely

necessary that such animals should be frequently well groomed. There

is no necessity, given a wire-hair with a good and proper coat, to

use anything but an ordinary close-toothed comb, a good hard brush,

and an occasional removal of long old hairs on the head, ears, neck,

legs, and belly, with the finger and thumb. The Kennel Club

regulations for the preparation of dogs for exhibition are perfectly

clear on this subject, and are worded most properly. They say that

a dog shall be disqualified if any part of his coat or hair has been

cut, clipped, singed, or rasped down by any substance, or if any of

the new or fast coat has been removed by pulling or plucking in any

manner, and that no comb shall be used which has a cutting or

rasping edge. There is no law, therefore, against the removal of

old coat by finger and thumb, and anyone who keeps long-haired dogs

knows that it is essential to the dog's health that there should be

none.



It is in fact most necessary in certain cases, at certain times, to

pull old coat out in this way. Several terriers with good coats are

apt to grow long hair very thickly round the neck and ears, and unless

this is removed when it gets old, the neck and ears are liable to

become infested with objectionable little slate-coloured nits, which

will never be found as long as the coat is kept down when necessary.

Bitches in whelp and after whelping, although ordinarily good-coated,

seem to go all wrong in their coats unless properly attended to in

this way, and here again, if you wish to keep your bitch free from

skin trouble, it is a necessity, in those cases which need it, to

use finger and thumb.



If the old hair is pulled out only when it is old, there is no

difficulty about it, and no hurt whatever is occasioned to the dog,

who does not in reality object at all. If, however, new or fast coat

is pulled out it not only hurts the dog but it is also a very foolish

thing to do, and the person guilty of such a thing fully merits

disqualification.



Most of the nonsense that is heard about trimming emanates, of course,

from the ignoramus; the knife, he says, is used on them all, a sharp

razor is run over their coats, they are singed, they are cut, they

are rasped (the latter is the favourite term). Anything like such

a sweeping condemnation is quite inaccurate and most unfair. It is

impossible to cut a hair without being detected by a good judge, and

very few people ever do any such thing, at any rate for some months

before the terrier is exhibited, for if they do, they know they are

bound to be discovered, and, as a fact, are.



When the soft-coated dogs are clipped they are operated on, say, two

or three months before they are wanted, and the hair gets a chance

to grow, but even then it is easily discernible, and anyone who, like

the writer, has any experience of clipping dogs in order to cure them

of that awful disease, follicular mange, knows what a sight the animal

is when he grows his coat, and how terribly unnatural he looks.



The wire-hair has never been in better state than he is to-day; he

is, generally speaking, far ahead of his predecessors of twenty-five

years ago, not only from a show point of view, but also in working

qualities. One has only to compare the old portraits of specimens

of the variety with dogs of the present day to see this. A good many

individual specimens of excellent merit, it is true, there were, but

they do not seem to have been immortalised in this way. The portraits

of those we do see are mostly representations of awful-looking brutes,

as bad in shoulders, and light of bone, as they could be; they appear

also to have had very soft coats, somewhat akin to that we see on

a Pomeranian nowadays, though it is true this latter fault may have

been that of the artist, or probably amplified by him.



Perhaps the strongest kennel of wire-hairs that has existed was that

owned a good many years ago by Messrs. Maxwell and Cassell. Several

champions were in the kennel at the same time, and they were a sorty

lot of nice size, and won prizes all over the country. Jack Frost,

Jacks Again, Liffey, Barton Wonder, Barton Marvel, and several other

good ones, were inmates of this kennel, the two latter especially

being high-class terriers, which at one time were owned by Sir H.

de Trafford. Barton Marvel was a very beautiful bitch, and probably

the best of those named above, though Barton Wonder was frequently

put above her. Sir H. de Trafford had for years a very good kennel

of the variety, and at that time was probably the biggest and best

buyer.



Mr. Carrick, of Carlisle, was also a prominent owner years ago, and

showed some excellent terriers, the best being Carlisle Tack, Trick,

and Tyro. The latter was an exceptionally good dog.



Mr. Sam Hill, of Sheffield, had also a strong kennel, always well

shown by George Porter, who is now, and has been for some years, in

America, where he still follows his old love. Mr. Hill's name will

ever be associated with that of his great dog Meersbrook Bristles,

who has undoubtedly done the breed a great amount of good. Mr. Mayhew

is another old fancier, who nearly always showed a good one. Mr.

Mayhew has been in America now for many years. One dog of his, who

it is believed became a champion, viz. Brittle, did at one time a

big business at stud, perhaps not to the advantage of the breed, for

he was possessed of a very bad fault, in that he had what was called

a topknot ring, a bunch of soft silky hairs on his forehead, an

unfailing sign of a soft coat all over, and a thing which breeders

should studiously avoid. This topknot was at one time more prevalent

than it is now. Whether it is a coincidence or not one cannot say,

but it is a fact that in the writer's experience several terriers

possessed of this fault have also blue markings, which again are

almost invariably accompanied by a soft coat, and taking these two

peculiarities together it would seem that at some time, years ago,

a cross with that wonderfully game but exceedingly soft-coated

terrier, the Bedlington, may have been resorted to, though if so it

would appear that nowadays any effect of it is gradually dying out.



Mr. George Raper is one of the old fanciers who has for many years

owned some of the best specimens of the variety, Ch. Go Bang perhaps

being the most notable. Go Bang was a beautiful terrier; there was

no denying his quality. Mr. Raper sold him to Mr. G. M. Carnochan,

of New York, for something like P500, probably the biggest price that

has ever been paid for any Fox-terrier. Mr. Hayward Field is another

gentleman who has been exhibiting the breed for very many years, and

has owned several good terriers. The late Mr. Clear had also at one

time a strong kennel, the best of which by a long way was Ch. Jack

St. Leger.



Mr. Wharton was a well-known exhibitor and judge some time back. It

was he who owned that excellent little terrier Ch. Bushey Broom, who

created quite a furore when first exhibited at the Westminster

Aquarium.



Mr. Harding Cox was years ago a great supporter of the variety. He

exhibited with varying success, and was always much in request as

a judge; one knew in entering under him that he wanted firstly a

terrier, and further that the terrier had to be sound. Mr. Cox

has of course played a big part in the popularisation of the

Fox-terrier, for, as all the world knows, he was the instigator of

the Fox-terrier Club, it being founded at a meeting held at his house.

His love has ever been for the small terrier, and certainly the

specimens shown by him, whatever their individual faults, were

invariably a sporting, game-looking lot. Mr. Sidney Castle has for

many years shown wire-hair Fox-terriers of more than average merit;

and thoroughly understands the variety, indeed, perhaps as well as

anybody. Messrs. Bartle, Brumby Mutter, G. Welch, and S. Wilson, are

all old fanciers who have great experience, have bred and shown

excellent specimens.



In mentioning the names of celebrated men and terriers of years gone

by, reference must be made to a terrier shown some time ago, which

was as good, taken all round, as any that have so far appeared. This

was Ch. Quantock Nettle, afterwards purchased by a gentleman in Wales

and renamed Lexden Nettle. Of correct size, with marvellous character,

an excellent jacket and very takingly marked with badger tan and black

on a wonderful head and ears, this bitch swept the board, as they

say, and unquestionably rightly so.



No article on the wire-hair Fox-terrier would be complete without

mentioning the name of the late Mr. S. E. Shirley, President of the

Kennel Club. Mr. Shirley was a successful exhibitor in the early days

of the variety, and while his terriers were a good-looking lot, though

not up to the show form of to-day, they were invariably hard-bitten,

game dogs, kept chiefly for work.



On the question of size nearly all the principal judges of the

Fox-terrier are agreed. Their maxim is a good little one can always

beat a good big one. The difficulty arises when the little ones are

no good, and the big ones are excellent; it is a somewhat common

occurrence, and to anyone who loves a truly formed dog, and who knows

what a truly formed dog can do, it is an extremely difficult thing

to put the little above the larger. All big dogs with properly placed

shoulders and sound formation are better terriers for work of any

sort than dogs half their size, short on the leg, but bad in these

points. It is in reality impossible to make an inexorable rule about

this question of size; each class must be judged on its own merits.