The name of Hound

A Caninical Investigation with Apologies to Umberto Eco

by Philip Weller MHS

Explanatory Note: The above sub-title is not only an apology in connection with the adaptation of the title of Signor Eco's masterpiece, Il nome della rosa (The Name of the Rose), which is inevitably brought to mind here through its hero, William of Baskerville, but a recognition of the inspiration which Umberto Eco has provided for all of those who are interested in the realms of word meaning and use, through the leading rôle which he has played in the world of semiotics. It should be noted that in order to identify references to the Hound which Stapleton bought from Ross & Mangles, that specific Hound is referred to as The Hound.

"It was not a pure bloodhound and it was not a pure mastiff; but it appeared to be a
combination of the two - gaunt, savage, and as large as a small lioness." [HOUN 757]

The Head Office Staff of the FMHC first became aware of what might be called 'The Mastino Problem' when we were preparing the lectures which we were to present in Italy in the Autumn of 2000. For these lectures we created overhead projector slides giving summary notes in Italian of the information which accompanied each of the 200 colour transparencies which were projected during our talks. In order to do this we down-loaded the Italian titles of the 60 Canonical cases from the Internet, and we were rather surprised at some of the non-literal translations which were involved there, although each of these did raise interesting questions of the way in which others have seen the Canon. Our Italian colleagues within the Italian Sherlock Holmes Society (Uno Studio in Holmes - USIH) have mentioned the unexpected translations of just four cases, but there are others, such as 'The Decisive Race' for SHOS, 'The Vanished Full-Back' for MISS, 'Gentlemen Thieves' for CHAS and 'The Pale-Faced Soldier' for BLAN. With the translation of The Hound of the Baskervilles as Il mastino dei Baskerville (The Mastiff of the Baskervilles), we could see the rationale behind the choice of the word mastino, even though we did not agree with it, but we did erroneously think that it was a unanimously accepted title in Italy, since all of the four Italian copies of the book in our collection at that time bore the title of Il mastino dei Baskerville. When we arrived in Milano we quickly bought three further Italian editions of HOUN, and we were surprised to find that one of these was entitled Il cane dei Baskerville, or The Dog of the Baskervilles. Cane does evoke a clearer indication of the whole canine world, rather than just Hounds, if one is tempted to separate Hounds from other dogs, as is possible in this discussion, ⁽¹⁾ but this translation also did not really fit our own understanding of the English title. There is the Italian phrase "cane da caccia", meaning, literally, "a dog of the chase", which is used for a Hound or a sporting dog or a gun-dog, but a multiple-word phrase does not have the impact which the single word 'Hound' has in the original English title. Our generous Italian hosts, upon discovering that we collect editions of HOUN, produced three more copies as gifts, with each of these copies using mastino. When presenting the first lecture we came to the showing of a slide connected with HOUN, and revealed the overhead projector note which explained it, and which involved the use of the word mastino. There was then that very faint intake of a collective breath which warns the experienced lecturer that something is not quite right or truly acceptable. Wanting to show our appreciation of the probable situation, we quickly crossed out the word mastino on the slide, and inserted the word cane. There was then that definite audience murmur which indicates a potential point for later discussion, and this was noted, and the discussion duly ensued, albeit for far too short a time. With almost the whole of the audience being Holmesians, there seemed to be a general disfavour for mastino, and several supporters of cane, but amongst the latter there was a reference to the 'essence of dog' as being an almost-Platonic Idealist justification for the use of cane, which indicated that these were, indeed, deep waters. We decided to raise this matter again at a later date, and that led eventually to the Anglo-Italian dialogue which is presented in this issue of the journal of the FMHC, and which will be presented in translation in the journal of USIH.

Our three Italian colleagues who have contributed to the subject for us have nicely explained the situation which exists with Italian translations of the title of HOUN, and they have, quite reasonably, concentrated upon the two Canonical candidates for influencing the breed of The Hound. Italians do, in fact, have their own words for these two breeds: il segugio for the Bloodhound, and il mastino for the Mastiff. The first of these Italian words can also be used, according to most good Italian-English dictionaries, to mean 'Hound', but there is a problem with this, as has been mentioned by our Italian colleagues, in that in modern Italian usage il segugio dei Baskerville would tend to suggest 'The Big Playful Pup of the Baskervilles'. These two Italian breed words do generate further difficulties, as will be seen shortly, but there is a more-basic problem here, however, in that we are not looking for the name of a breed of dog, but for an Italian word for the English word 'Hound', and 'Hound' in English is not the name of a specific breed of dog, but of a group of several different breeds of dog. It is also important to appreciate that we are not concerned with all the possible types of Hound, in that these can be divided into two major sub-groups: those which rely primarily upon a fine sense of sight when they are hunting their prey, the Sight Hounds, and those which rely primarily upon a fine sense of smell, the Scent Hounds, to track their prey. With the crucial emphasis in HOUN upon the way in which The Hound tracks Sir Henry from the smell of one of his old boots, it is clearly a Scent Hound with which we are concerned, and this enables us to limit our considerations.

We must also be careful here not to be anachronistic, as has happened with the numerous Sherlockians in the USA who have discussed the breed of The Hound using classifications and breeds which did not exist in 1889, or even in 1902 when Watson's description of The Hound was first published. Current divisions into groups are far more meticulously defined than they were at the end of the 19^th Century. There are now many different groups of dogs which have been established, essentially for dog show purposes, but at the end of the Victorian era the Kennel Club of England had only two divisions: Sporting Dogs and Non-Sporting Dogs. Interestingly, Bloodhounds were included in the first of these, whilst Mastiffs were included in the second, once again stressing that The Hound, as a Hound, could not be a Mastiff. Attempts were, however, being made to produce something similar to the divisions which exist now, based upon the form and development of the different breeds involved. In 1884, E L Harting had, in The Zoologist (Volume VIII), suggested six groups: Wolf-Like Dogs, Greyhounds, Spaniels, Hounds, Mastiffs and Terriers. One can see the problems involved, however, from the fact that Greyhounds and Hounds were separate groups, in spite of the seeming similarity in the names of the breeds. An interesting historical point here is that the coat of arms of one of the main branches of the Baskerville family includes a Hound with a spear through its head, derived from a family legend about a drunken Baskerville killing his Hound, with the Hound in the crest looking very much more like a Greyhound than any other breed of dog! In the present context, it will be noted that the Mastiff group is clearly separated from the Hound group, which yet again denies the possibility of The Hound being a Mastiff. One might also note, incidentally, that two other dog groups in Harting's list are also involved in HOUN: the Spaniels, with that group including Mortimer's Curly-Haired Spaniel, and the Terriers, with the jaw width of that group being compared with that of Mortimer's Spaniel and that of the Mastiff.

The ancestors of our Italian colleagues were involved in a broadening of the divisional system of classifying dogs at a much earlier stage, in that the Romans had a three-fold system based on utilitarian principles, with: House Dogs (canes villatici), Shepherd Dogs (canes pastorales) and Sporting Dogs (canes venatici). The last group was sub-divided into: Fighting Dogs (pugnaces), such as Mastiffs and Bulldogs, and Hunting Dogs (sagaces), such as the various Hounds, which once again emphasises the difference between Mastiffs and Hounds. Because of references to Mastiffs in arena events in Classical Rome, it is sometimes claimed that Mastiffs originated in Italy, but the Romans first encountered these formidable dogs when they came to England, and appreciating the ferocity and courage which Mastiffs then exhibited, they took them back to Rome with them. Our other primary breed concern, the Bloodhound, only became mentioned regularly as a separate breed at the end of the first Millennium CE. If we look at those English dogs which were considered to be Hounds at the end of the 19^th Century, we have (alphabetically): Basset Hounds, Beagles, Bloodhounds, Deerhounds, Foxhounds, Greyhounds, Harriers, Irish Wolfhounds, Otter Hounds and Whippets. The small size of the majority of these breeds makes them unlikely to have been involved in the breeding of The Hound, and Watson's description of the appearance of The Hound suggests that the most important of these breeds is the Bloodhound. Emphasis will accordingly be given here to this breed, even above that of the possible influence of the Mastiff which is also mentioned in Watson's description. This is justified on the grounds that The Hound is repeatedly referred to as a Hound, rather than as a dog or as a Mastiff, with the latter breed never having been part of the Hound group of dogs. What is being suggested is that The Hound was, basically, a Bloodhound, with traces of Mastiff, rather than the other way around. We do have frequent references in Watson's account to The Hound as being a Hound, and none to it being a Mastiff, and the title which Watson gave to his recording of the adventure is certainly not 'The Mastiff of the Baskervilles'. This all, of course, very clearly argues against the use of the word mastino for The Hound.

Far too many myths of Bloodhounds attacking men exist, and these have become as much part of the public image as have Holmes's calabash and deerstalker. A late-Victorian writer on canine matters, the Kennel Editor of the sporting magazine, The Field, Rawdon B Lee, summarised the situation nicely in 1893, just four years after the HOUN case took place. Referring to the Bloodhound, he wrote:

The alternative name for the Bloodhound, Sleuth-Hound, is one which brings direct and obvious associations with Holmes. When Holmes goes off to violin-land, Watson contrasts Holmes the music enthusiast with "--- Holmes, the sleuth-hound ---" [REDH 185]. Even more-pertinently, when Holmes mentions writing a monograph on the use of dogs in the work of the detective, Watson immediately mentions the practice of using "Bloodhounds - sleuth-hounds ---". [CREE 1071]. In that case, in fact, Holmes is actually referring to the resemblance which develops between a dog and its owner, and he specifically suggests that: "Snarling people have snarling dogs, dangerous people have dangerous dogs." [CREE 1071], where he may well have been reflecting upon Stapleton. If Holmes's theory is correct, and if he ever kept a dog after his retirement, it should surely have been a Hound, and most probably a Bloodhound, or Sleuth-Hound. Less speculatively, one should note the fact that Bloodhounds were used to increase the size of other Hounds through cross-breeding, and that this also achieved improved scent sensing abilities and the sound generating abilities of those hounds, which are all points which are pertinent to the development of The Hound.

To return to purely nominative considerations, however, the name Sleuth-Hound is not derived directly from 'sleuth' as a detective, but quite the reverse, with the Old English word 'sleuth' meaning a trail or track which can be followed. The word is also linked directly with the old Scottish, and Middle English, word 'slough' for a mire (used memorably by Milton with 'The Slough of Despond'), and one must remember that ACD frequently attempted to revive the use of archaic words, that he was born in Scotland, and that he read widely amongst the Scottish and English classics. There is thus a highly relevant link between Bloodhounds and the Dartmoor of HOUN, with its sleuths and mires. This also extends to another period of English and Scottish history, for in the 16^th and 17^th Centuries, men known as Moss-Troopers (a rather romantic name for brutish, murdering Scottish cattle thieves) regularly crossed the boggy moss (or mire or slough) of the South-Western Scottish border into the homeland of the Reverend James Desmond, Westmoreland [HOUN 695]. In 1616, a warrant was issued to the garrison at Carlisle, in Westmoreland, for the keeping of Slough-Hounds, with one at each of nine villages around the border. Interestingly, one of those border villages had the name of Stapleton! Sir Walter Scott, almost inevitably, given his frequent over-romanticisation of Scottish criminal bands, mentioned these border raiders, and ACD admired and imitated Scott's subject matter and romantic adventure style on many occasions. The question was raised by at least one dog enthusiast in the late 19^th Century, when studies of the origins and development of Hounds were becoming popular, about the cost of keeping these earlier Slough-Hounds well enough fed to have prevented them becoming so ravenous that they might actually turn against their nature and attack their quarries, and Holmes stated that The Hound was "--- savage and half-starved." [HOUN 766] at the time that it attacked Sir Henry, when Watson queried the fact that The Hound could not have merely frightened Sir Henry to death in the way that it had frightened Sir Charles. It is to be noted that Watson is emphasising the different nature of the character of The Hound at the time of its two assaults on Baskervilles, with the first attack resembling that of a Bloodhound and the second resembling that of a Mastiff.

Whilst dealing with nominative connotations, one must also note that a tertiary meaning of the word 'hound' in Victorian times was 'a despicable man'. The Bard himself had used this term in this way in the 16^th Century, when he had Coriolanus say: " 'Boy!' False hound …" (Coriolanus, Act 5, Scene 6, Line 113), although Thwaite had used the word in the same way as early as 1000 CE. In this sense we thus have both Stapleton and his father as The Hound of the Baskervilles, not to mention the wicked Hugo Baskerville! Given the specific wife-beating character of Stapleton, one might note, in this context, the Italian phrase "quel cane di marito!", meaning "that brute of a husband!". One should also note, however, that in the year of HOUN, 1889, it was not illegal for a man to imprison and beat his wife, since the law was not changed to ban such activities until 1891.

The two breeds mentioned by Watson in describing The Hound, however, do have a great significance in determining whether an appropriate word for 'Hound' can be found in Italian. On looking up the word 'hound' in a good Anglo-Italian dictionary, ⁽³⁾ it was found that the translation given was segugio, which, as previously mentioned, immediately causes a problem over the potential confusion between a specific breed, the Bloodhound (segugio) and the general group of dogs known as Hounds (segugio) in Italian. On checking the English meaning of this Italian word in the same dictionary, which is always a good way of testing understanding in such situations, it was found that there is another meaning for segugio, apart from those of Hound and Bloodhound, and this is, figuratively, "sleuth-hound", as a term for a detective. There is the Italian verb, seguire, which means "to follow", and following is much closer to the action of a Hound than are suggestions of attack. Indeed, the correct term for what a Hound often does with its prey is, in English, called 'hounding', and this understanding of a fourth meaning for the word 'hound' as a verb is important in English for emphasising the way in which the Baskervilles are hounded by The Hound, and ACD was too good a wordsmith not to have recognised that extra frisson. There is, almost inevitably, no direct Italian word for the verb 'to hound', but there is a good 'English' link with Italian for what this verb implies, in that it is what the paparazzi do to their prey, in chasing and causing concern and upset in their human prey without deliberately attempting to attack that prey. Sometimes, as we know, the hounding of the paparazzi does sadly result in the death of their prey. Another Italian alternative for the word 'Hound' is bracco, with support being given for this word by the Italian verb braccare, which is used figuratively to mean 'to hunt', and perhaps this comes close to the English meaning.

The two great nations for using Scent Hounds for hunting have been France and Britain. Hounds were used for hunting in Britain during the first Millennium CE, but these were the smaller Hounds which were used mainly for hunting hares and rabbits. Larger Hounds were introduced to Britain with the arrival of the man known more-accurately in his Norman homeland as Guilliame le Bâtard, but who is better-known in Britain as William the Conqueror, or King William I. His knights brought very large Hounds with them to Britain, and these Hounds had been used in France for hunting deer. They did not need the speed of the earlier British Hounds, but they did need the stamina and size and weight and courage involved in bringing down a fierce, cornered stag after a long chase through the forest. These Hounds were derived from the famous St Hubert's Hound, ⁽⁴⁾ and they existed in two forms: a white Hound known as the Talbot, which has sadly become extinct other than on old pub signs in England, and a black and brown Hound which was the ancestor of the Bloodhound. Amongst William's retinue there was a name which is entirely relevant to the present discussion - Nicolas de Basquerville. ⁽⁵) If the Baskervilles took their huge Hounds to what was the extremely remote region of Devonshire in the 11^th Century, with most of Dartmoor being useful for nothing other than hunting between the 11^th and 19^th Centuries, and with only the smaller British Hounds having been seen there before, this may well have encouraged the development of a fear of these truly monstrous creatures, and with fear comes legend. That fear may well have engendered the exaggeration which is inevitably involved with legends, and elements of that fear may have been present when the legend of 'The Curse of the Baskervilles' was first recorded by the good Hugo Baskerville in 1742. Pertinently, Dartmoor became classified legally as a Forest long before 1742, with a Forest technically then having nothing specifically to do with trees, in that it then merely meant an area set aside as a hunting preserve for the King. There were thus long traditions of hunting and of unusually large Hounds present on Dartmoor, and that there was another large breed present in the Dartmoor Forest. Under the pernicious Forest Laws which were in place between the 11^th and 13^th Centuries, ordinary people were not allowed to keep dogs within the Forest boundaries, but there was one breed which was specifically exempted for non-Normans who were large landowners and farmers: the Mastiff. In addition to being fearsome, large Hounds and large Mastiffs would therefore have been seen by the common folk of the Dartmoor Forest as being representative of the oppressive Normans and their lickspittle lackeys!

To return to our other crucial breed, the Bloodhound, these were increasingly developed not to attack, but merely to trail, and by the second half of the 19^th Century they had attained the characteristics stipulated by the Kennel Club in England:

It should be noted that the Bloodhound has more of the characteristics of The Hound than any other breed, and he might therefore be seen as the archetypal Hound. He is very long from nose to tail, "--- stands over more ground ---", which would encourage the impression that The Hound was the size of a calf or of a small lioness, and he was also "--- very powerful ---". He is, however, affectionate, and Bloodhounds are, in fact, very tolerant of children. This affectionate aspect might tie in with the same characteristic seen by Italians in the image which some of them now associate with the word segugio. One must, however, question whether it was possible to introduce some of the ferocious characteristics of the Mastiff into the more-placid Bloodhound towards the end of the 19^th Century. This was, indeed, a time for much experimentation in developing first-cross breeds - a direct breeding of one pure breed with another pure breed - and the question arises as to whether this was possible with a Bloodhound and a Mastiff. Many Holmesians have suggested that this was impossible, but without giving any justification for this.⁽⁷) However, a leading authority on dogs at the end of the 19^th Century, Rawdon B Lee, recorded that there was some discussion of precisely this first-cross in 1894, and he indicated that there was an air of mystery about it. In outlining recent developments of the Mastiff he wrote:

True Holmesians, who accept the word of Watson, would no doubt be able to provide Mr Lee with answers to his questions: when? - 1889; who? - Ross and Mangles in the Fulham Road! Doubt has also been expressed about the possibility of achieving a black result from crossing a Bloodhound and a Mastiff, but once again Lee touches upon a relevant point. He describes the way in which, according to him, Mr H V Lukey of Morden in Kent, greatly improved the quality of English Mastiffs in the 19^th Century. Lukey obtained a brindled bitch Mastiff from White's, the dealers in Knightsbridge. It might be noted that the Fulham Road, the abode of Ross and Mangles, runs into the Knightsbridge thoroughfare in London! Lukey's bitch was mated with what Lee calls "… a black dog …" Mastiff belonging to the Marquis of Hertford, which some authorities consider was an Alpine Mastiff. The resulting bitch was then mated with another Alpine Mastiff, and the product of that mating became the foundation of the new, improved breed standard. Lee records that:

It may seem to be remarkable that Lee here introduces the concepts of a black dog and of evil recurring across the generations when HOUN is so dominated by the theories of Atavism, but these theories were very popular at the end of the 19^th Century. ⁽¹⁰) Lee continues by discussing what is, for him, the ideal appearance of a Mastiff, and he is interestingly revealing in a negative manner when he writes:

Let us consider this description of the Hound in terms of the description of The Hound in HOUN. Lee indicates that a Hound differs from a Mastiff in that the former has "… loose skin under his throat, and deeply pendulous dewlaps." Dr Watson describes The Hound as follows: "--- it's muzzle and hackles and dewlap were outlined in flickering flame." [HOUN 757] The dewlaps of The Hound could thus be seen clearly at night against the glow of the cunning preparation of phosphorous, at a distance of around 50 yards [HOUN 754], whereas a Mastiff should not have had pronounced dewlaps. There is though the "--- savage face ---" [HOUN 757] of The Hound, which does indicate the influence of the Mastiff. With all this talk of cross-breeding, however, we must recall constantly that Dr Watson does not say that The Hound was a cross between a Bloodhound and a Mastiff, as his evidence is also negative, in that he says of The Hound that: "It was not a pure bloodhound and not a pure mastiff ---" [HOUN 757], and we must also note that he only says that The Hound "--- appeared to be a combination of the two." [HOUN 757 - underlining emphasis added], not that it was such a combination, so the points on appearances above are particularly pertinent.

Reference has been made to the increased development of dog and hound breeding programmes at the end of the 19^th Century in England, and this is as true of the Bloodhound as of other breeds, with the establishment of the Association of Bloodhound Breeders, and with the interest which they created with the remarkable series of trials which they carried out on the Yorkshire Moors in 1898. Watson may have been aware of such developments and trials when he came to record his account of the Baskerville case in 1901, and his medical and literary colleague, Arthur Conan Doyle, would certainly been aware of such developments, in that he had recently become an active member of his local hunt at Hindhead. Aficionados of the hunt would also have been aware of the problems which could arise from cross-breeding at the time of the Baskerville case, for what was possibly the most famous pack of Bloodhounds ever to exist in England, The Savernake Bloodhounds, was destroyed in 1887 by their owner, Lord Ailesbury, after they had been cross-bred with Foxhounds or Buckhounds and had become dangerously savage. The size of the Bloodhound is certainly not to be underestimated, in that another famous Bloodhound pack, belonging to Lord Wolverton, was used to hunt deer in Dorset until 1879, and other owners later followed his example.⁽¹²)

Given the emphasis on Atavism in the account of the Baskerville case, one might suggest that there is an even stronger element of savagery present in The Hound when it attacks Sir Henry, with the canine ferocity here being similar to that of the days when the Baskervilles first arrived in England in the 11^th Century. The ancestor of the Bloodhound was, as mentioned above, a far more attacking creature in those days. There is, of course, the possibility of a cross-breeding influence of the Mastiff element in The Hound, but previously the Bloodhound element seems to have controlled this attacking characteristic of the Mastiff, for there is no specific evidence that The Hound attacked Sir Charles or Selden. It cannot be stressed too strongly that it is only when The Hound had become "--- half-starved ---" [HOUN 766] that he definitely attacks someone, Sir Henry [HOUN 757]. Holmes implies that the only reason why The Hound did not savage Sir Charles is that Hounds do not attack dead creatures [HOUN 763], but this is nonsense, since all Hounds eat dead meat, and a starving one certainly could have savaged a dead man to get meat. It is suggested here that having been "--- incited by its master ---" to chase Sir Charles [HOUN 763], The Hound did what most modern Hounds do, which is not to attack their prey but merely corner it, and then, as Holmes suggests, it was "--- called off ---" by its master and taken back to its lair [HOUN 763], exactly as happens with a Bloodhound. It must also be noticed that there is no indication that The Hound attacked Selden, in spite of the graphic inventions of various film studios, as we merely have a description of the sound of Selden being chased by a Hound, and then of Selden being found after falling from a cliff, for it is significant that Watson records only the crushed skull of the convict, without any reference to him having been savaged [HOUN 743]. Although the lack of ferocity of the Bloodhound has generally, and quite rightly, been emphasised here, it should be noted that there were complaints that when Lord Ailesbury re-established his pack of Bloodhounds at Savernake in 1895, with that pack continuing until 1914, these Hounds did, very occasionally, kill deer.

All of the above evidence seems to suggest that there was a dominating Hound aspect to The Hound, and we should therefore reject considerations of dogs which were not Hounds, like the Mastiff, in choosing the Italian word for 'Hound' in the title of The Hound of the Baskervilles. We thus have several alternatives which are available to us, or rather to our Italian colleagues. They could continue to accept the use of mastino, in Il mastino dei Baskerville, with its well-established connotations amongst non-Holmesian Italians, and with the perpetuation of the way in which most Italians automatically continue with "--- dei Baskerville" if prompted with "Il mastino ---". They could agree to the suggestion of Il cane dei Baskerville which has already been accepted by a few publishers in rejection of the incorrectness of concentrating on the Mastiff elements of The Hound, but The Dog of the Baskervilles really should not be considered as an acceptable title, with its lack of emphasis on the special characteristics of a Hound. They could choose the option of avoiding the problem by translating the title as meaning The Curse, or The Beast or The Monster of the Baskervilles, but all of these lose the relevance of the perfect title, in English, of The Hound. They could accept the fact that there is no really appropriate modern Italian word for 'Hound' and do as the English frequently do when faced with a similar situation, which is to use a foreign word which is totally appropriate (as the English have done with paparazzi). They could thus have Il hound dei Baskerville. The Italians, however, are rightly proud of their language and might feel insulted by such a remedy. Alternatively, they could revive the Victorian period usage of the Italian word segugio to be understood as 'Hound', and have Il segugio dei Baskerville. It is very difficult, however, to change the perceived meaning of a word deliberately in this way, and misunderstandings about the meaning of the title of the book would therefore occur, with an almost-inevitable reduction of the ferocious reputation of The Hound. The best alternative which this commentator can offer is that one should avoid confrontations with modern Italian and compliment instead the sagacity (our Italian colleagues are asked to excuse the Anglo-Roman play on words here) of those who provided the source of that language, the Romans, who decided that dogs used for hunting purposes should be called, as a group, sagaces, which was a group which included what we would now call Hounds. We thus propose the title Il sagace dei Baskerville, but we do so with the appreciation that almost all attempts at artificially controlling the use of language have failed, as has been seen most particularly with the perfectly understandable attempts which various French governments have made to protect their language against the contamination of other languages. With Italy, one fears that the linguistic grip of Il mastino is probably at least as strong as is the physical grip of the jaws of the creature which currently bears that name in most Italian editions of HOUN.

1. In an entirely pertinent, if slightly anachronistic, way, one of the classic texts on dogs for sportsmen, edited by A Coxton Smith, with contributions from numerous aristocratic dog breeders, is entitled: Hounds & Dogs, clearly distinguishing between Hounds and all other forms of dog. This is the volume dealing with dogs in the Lonsdale Library series of books for sportsmen: Smith A C (ed), Hounds & Dogs; Their Care Training & Working; for Hunting, Shooting, Coursing, Hawking, Police Purposes, &c, The Lonsdale Library Vol XIII, Seeley, Service & Co Ltd, Undated (but possibly 1932). It lists 14 different breeds of Hound: Afghan Hound, Basset Hound, Beagle, Bloodhound, Borzoi, Deerhound, Foxhound, Greyhound, Old-Fashioned Harrier, Irish Wolfhound, Otter Hound, Saluki, Staghound, Whippet. Not all of these are relevant to a discussion of Hounds in England in 1889.

2. Lee R B, A History and Description of the Modern Dogs of Great Britain and England - Sporting Division - Vol 1 (3^rd Edition), Horace Cox, 1906 (1^st edition 1893), pp 2-3.

3. Clari M & Love C E (General Editors), Nuovo dizionario inglesi-italiano, Collins & Mondadori, 2000.

4. A truly seminal breed, with the first pack supposedly being created in the 6^th Century in the Ardennes by St Hubert.

5. Some authorities suggest that the name was spelled 'Beceurville' on the now-lost Roll of Battle Abbey (see: Baskerville Rance P (ed), Baskerville Family History, at: http://www.moonrakers.com/genealogy/baskerville/baskerville_family_history.htm), and that the Baskerville Mynors branch of the family was also mentioned therein.

6. Quoted in: Lee R B, op cit (2), pp 49 & 50.

7. Most recently, the Oxford World Classic's edition of HOUN has commented: "this is said by experts to be impossible" [Explanatory Notes p 197]. One must ask: which experts, and on what grounds?

8. Lee R B, A History and Description of the Modern Dogs of Great Britain and England - Non-Sporting Division - Vol 2 (1^st Edition), Horace Cox, 1894, p 74.

9. Lee R B, op cit (8), p 76.

10. See: Weller P L, 'The Medics and the Cleric - Atavism and other Topics', The New Baker Street Pillar Box No 29, February 1997, pp 35-41.

11. Lee R B, op cit (8), p 76.

12. The average height (at the shoulder) of a male Bloodhound at the time of the Baskerville case would have been around 26 inches (66 cm), but the influence of cross-breeding could easily have increased this by a large degree, and breeders at that time were being encouraged to increase the height of Bloodhounds. Male Bloodhounds weighed up to 110 lbs (50 kg) at that time.

Drury W D & Others, British Dogs - The Various Breeds (3^rd Edition), L Upcott Gill, 1906 (1^st Edition, in 3 Volumes, 1887).

Smith A C, Hounds & Dogs, Seeley, Service & Co Ltd, Undated (first known dated edition, 1932).

Wimhurst C G E, The Book of the Hound, Frederick Muller, 1964.