The Toy Spaniel Club has not improved matters for its breed of late by a recent rule which restricts all judging appointments in future to members of the club, thus excluding all independent opinion. I think it very undesirable that moral pressure of any kind should be put on open shows to choose club judges for whatever breed it may be. Let club shows choose their own judges by all means, but a club rule which refuses the selection of any independent judge, under pain of withdrawing its patronage, seems to me in itself an infringement of the spirit of the Kennel Club regulations as to influencing judging appointments. What would be thought of the Kennel Club if it drafted a rule that no man should judge who was not a member and refused challenge certificates on these grounds ? Yet this is what it Comes to when, as in the case of the Toy Spaniel Club, the club specials and cups are withdrawn, if the selection of the judge is not first approved by the committee of the club, three of whom form a quorum!

Why should any judge be compelled to pay toll to any club?

Who shall say that the secretaries of shows, warned of the penalty which follows any appointment outside the club list in the withdrawal of patronage and a corresponding shortage of entries, are not influenced to choose accordingly?

I do not, however, believe in the other extreme of electing judges by a majority of members. Only a very small number of fanciers know the points of their breed well enough to vote, and the ignorant majority will inevitably elect bad judges. I have heard it boldly given out by members of a club that novices should be put in to judge at championship shows, because it gives inferior dogs a chance of becoming champions! Novices should never judge at championship shows, as they are bound to make mistakes, and good dogs suffer most undeserved reverses at their hands. This is all the more unfair, because these reverses are recorded forever unexplained in the K. C. S. B., and I cannot too strongly urge the Kennel Club never to grant challenge certificates to classes judged by novices.

The Kennel Club has done a most extraordinary amount of good work in lessening the number of frauds, and a wholesome fear of its governing hand restrains most people from the more reckless and obvious forms of swindling. It does not seem to be generally known that the Kennel Club has a Shows Regulation Committee which will investigate suspicious cases without depending upon exhibitors to bring the cases forward by a formal complaint, thus laying themselves open to a libel action in case of a failure to bring legal proof of the correctness of their suspicions. Those who can supply evidence of any dishonesty at shows can therefore write to the head of this committee. They must, however, be sure of their facts, as if they supply false information they will naturally not improve their own reputation.

I am afraid that a great number of judges will never be able to resist putting up their friends' dogs, the temptation is so subtle and nothing can possibly happen to them in consequence. The contempt of the people who know a good dog from a bad one is all that they have to fear, and the material advantages of being on delightfully cordial terms with their friends is generally more important to them than a reputation of uncompromising rectitude and perfect judgment, coupled with that of being a most disagreeable man or woman. I have long studied the methods of women judges compared to men judges, and I have come to the conclusion that they are just about equal in every respect. On the whole, I think the women judges know the points of the Toy dogs better than the men. The only thing I have noticed is that in cases of unfairness, the unfairness takes a slightly different form. A man judge, who wishes to take it out of an exhibitor, puts that exhibitor's best dog right back, and with Machiavelian artfulness puts his worst exhibit first in another class. This removes the imputation of personal dislike and leaves his enemy helpless and fuming.

A woman, with few exceptions, goes for her enemy whole-heartedly and puts down all that enemy's exhibits to R. and V. H. C, knowing that these barren honours will produce a far more exasperating effect than being passed over altogether, as the dog then appears in the newspaper reports with disparaging remarks attached and everybody knows he has been beaten. A man, however, does not often put a dog down out of pure spite, though some will do so. It is generally only because he has a friend he wants to help, and, having given his friend a "leg up," he is satisfied and tries to make it up to the owner by giving him a "special." Things have come to such a pass that he is usually only too thankful for such small mercies.

A woman, too, will sometimes delude her enemy into showing under her by deliberately asking her to show and enthusiastically admiring her dogs in her hearing, so that when the day comes the blow is delivered with all the more effect. I have only once known a man do this. Nor will a man usually favour dogs of his own breeding with the unblushing publicity exhibited by ladies. On the other hand, a man will very often grossly favour ladies to whom he is partial. Considering the ferocious temper of some ladies in the ring, I must say I am sorry for a man who is confronted with the problem of publicly offending a lady he may be privately courting, by giving the coveted prize to her most hated doggy rival, or else of pocketing his judgment of her exhibit and being invited to dinner and made much of. He sees the devil on one hand and the deep sea on the other. What wonder if he slips with eyes shut into the sea? When a judge persistently puts up totally different types of dogs, mostly belonging to the same owner, it is always suspicious, and I consider that he should be required to explain his conduct as "an officer and a gentleman."

I have said the good work done by the Kennel Club can hardly be measured, and I cannot sufficiently admire the way in which it deals with the enormous amount of work it has to do. I hope that it will, however, forgive me if I make some slight criticisms on its management of minor matters and tell it a little of what is said of it behind its back. I do not think anyone questions the integrity of the Kennel Club, or its anxiety to put down fraud and right wrongs, but the schoolmaster is generally the last to know what goes on in his school, and it is really rather unfair to expect exhibitors to bring cases against each other. It is rather like asking schoolboys to "peach" on their school-fellows, and everyone knows the treatment such boys have to expect, however much they may be in the right. It is not quite the same, but there is an analogy, and before an exhibitor undertakes to show up a fraud, he must make up his mind to be put into Coventry and have his dogs put down after. Directly one of their number is attacked, rightly or wrongly, the other exhibitors (though they have never the pluck to support him openly) will privately make it as hot as they can for the attacking party, nor will they give evidence even in the most glaring cases.