He who attempts to discover the origin and trace the history of any one of our breeds of dogs, beyond a comparatively few generations, will, in most or all cases, speedily find himself in a fog, tossed on a sea of doubt, driven hither and thither by the conflicting evidence of the writers he consults, who seem to emulate each other in the meagreness of the information they give, and the vagueness with which they convey it. To this the Bloodhound is no exception; and it is, perhaps, wiser to accept the inevitable, and frankly admit that we know very little about the origin of this or any other breed, for at best we can but guess at the most probable from the very insufficient data at our command to form any certain opinion. This is certainly a wiser and more dignified course than to prate about this, that, and the other breed being the original dog of the British Islands, as many are disposed to do, One thing is very certain, that, could we go back, say, a thousand years, and select a hundred of the finest specimens then living, and bring them as they then were into competition with their descendants of to day, say, at a Crystal Palace show, the whole century of them would be quickly sent out of the ring as mongrels : they would stand no more chance than a herd of our ancient wild cattle would against a herd of Shorthorns.

The first printed book touching on dogs that we have is the "Book of Huntynge," by Juliana Berners. The list of dogs given by her does not include Bloodhounds, but it does the Lemor and Raches, both of which were dogs that ran their game by scent, and the former was probably the nearest approach to our notions of a hound, and was used to trace the wounded deer, etc., the name Lymer being taken from the fact of his being led in a leash, or lyam, In more ancient times the Lymehound, under the name of Inductor, appears to have been employed to lead up to the harbour of the game sought, being selected for that work on account of the superiority of his scenting powers. Xenophon (500 B.C.) describes a Lymehound as a dog that follows up by scent the quarry in quest, and then, calling others together, rouses the game by barking. The principles of breeding were sufficiently well known to the hunting men of Greece and Italy to assure us that this special superiority of nose would be propagated and improved by mating the animals most distinguished in that quality - in fact, the first principle in breeding, and one that lies on the surface, staring the most unobservant in the face, that like produces like, would certainly be acted on, and so the earliest steps be taken in fixing a special type of hound, the particular quality of which we see inherited now by many allied breeds.

No doubt at the date at which the "Book of Huntynge" was written, and for a long time previous, English hounds were being modified by crosses from imported dogs brought in by the Norman conquerors from France, some varieties of them having originally come from the East, and the slow hunting hounds of that day have, by various commixture, produced for us the varieties we now recognise.

Dr. Caius mentions the Bloodhound as "the greatest sort which serves to hunt, having lips of a large size, and ears of no small length." In Turberville's "Book of Hunting" there are a number of dogs portrayed, all of the hound type, and with true hound ears; whereas, in the "Book of St. Albans," printed a century earlier, the dogs represented have much smaller ears, and thrown back, as the dogs are seen straining on the slips, greyhound-like. Turberville has a good deal to say about hounds. If he could be credited, the progenitors of our modern dogs originally came from Greece, and the first of them that reached this country were landed at Totnes.

It was the custom in Turberville's time to range the dogs accord-ing to colour; of these, white and fallow, white spotted with red, and black, were most esteemed. White spotted with black or dun was not so much valued. The best of the fallow dogs were held to be those with their hair lively red, with white spots on the forehead, or a white ring round the neck; and of these it is said: "Those which are well joynted and dew-clawed are best to make Bloodhounds," clearly showing, as passages from all the old writers could be quoted to do, that the term Bloodhound was applied to the dog because of the work set him, and that, in fact, where hounds are spoken of the Bloodhound is included. That the work of this hound was varied - that he was used as a Lymehound, as well as in tracking wounded deer and deer-stealers, sheep-stealers, and other felons, even so late as two centuries ago - is clear from Blome's instructions in his work "The Gentleman's Recreation" (1688): "To find out the Hart or Stag, where his harbour or Lare is, you must be provided with a Bloodhound, Draughthound, or Sluithound, which must be led in a Liam; and, for the quickening his scent, it is good to rub his nose with vinegar."

Black hounds, called St. Huberts, are described as mighty of body, with legs low and short, not swift in work, but of good scent. The following couplet shows that the St. Hubert hounds were highly thought of: -

My name came first from holy Hubert's race ; Soygllard my sire, a hound of singular grace.

The Count le Couteulx de Canteleu, in his work "Les Races de Chiens Courans Francois," says: "The hounds of St. Hubert, famous since the eighth century, under the name of Flemish Hounds, were divided into two varieties, the black and the white. The most esteemed was the black variety, and the abbots of the St. Hubert Monastery preserved the breed in memory of their founder. They were generally black, running into tan, tan markings over the eye, and feet the same colour; long ears.

Descendants of the white St. Huberts existed in the Duke of Lorraine's hounds, spoken of by Ligniville; Salno also mentions the existence of the black and the white St. Huberts in their native country, the Ardennes.