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CHINA DOG ORNAMENTS.

ORIGIN OF THE DESIGN. The identity has been discovered by a correspondent of the London Times of those quaint little china effigies of dogs which used to be the most popular chimneypiece ornament in Early Victorian days. These dogs were always remarkably alike, even to facial expression, which was eo mild and gentle as to be almost inane; and their general colouring was white, with large ear of bright brown hanging down on each side of the face. There were usually one or two brown spots on the body, which was clothed in rather curly hair. The general aspect of the dog was that of a very chastened snaniel with a rather peaky nose. The ornaments were all so similar in their points as evidently to be correct representations of some familiar kind of dog which was then bred very true to type, and therefore presumably of value, but belonging to a breed which has been loet. for it corresponds to no kind of spaniel to-day. For many years the writer puzzled over the identity of the china dog in vain, until he picked up at a bookstall an odd bound volume of the Edinburgh Journal of Natural Historv and of the Physical Sciences, published in the year before Queen Victoria came to the throne. This contained many handcoloured plates, among them two of the various sporting dogs of the day. All wore recognisably the breeds from widen our modern sporting dogs have boon specialised, with one exception: a gentle little dog, sitting humbly in the background while all the others were in active sporting attitudes—the long-lost china dag. In every detail, with its brown ears and a few brown spots on white, and its very chastened expression, it left no of mistake. It was called the “ comforter ” At a time when the King Charles spaniel, now a waddling toy-dog like a long-haired black-and-tan pug, was an active httie sportino- doo- the comforter was the lap-dog of the day, originating from a cross between the Maltese and King Charles spaniels. It was first known as the spaniel-gentle, and found a place in every court lady a boudoir and drawing room, and the famous little which came out of the folds of fhe dreKs of Mery Queen of Scots after she was beheaded and tried to awaken the corpse with its caresses was a comforter. No wonder it was the most popular ornament on English mantelpieces S 7 years ago.

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Permanent link to this item

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/ODT19240115.2.121

Bibliographic details

Otago Daily Times, Issue 19069, 15 January 1924, Page 10

Word Count
412

CHINA DOG ORNAMENTS. Otago Daily Times, Issue 19069, 15 January 1924, Page 10

CHINA DOG ORNAMENTS. Otago Daily Times, Issue 19069, 15 January 1924, Page 10