Dog Show

When gay dogs get together there is apt to be noise. Last week 2,261 of them got together in Madison Square Garden, and the occasion was not a quiet one. Yaps filled the air, woofs, yowls, basso bur-wurs and tender tenor barks. Dogs were benched in neat interminable rows, undergoing the attentions of their henchmen or staring with melancholy eyes upon the crowd. Bitches sulked in their wire boudoirs. It was the Golden Jubilee show of the Westminster Kennel Club.

There was a lonely saluki, or gazelle hound, the only one of its species ever seen in Manhattan, a sly dog that looked for all the world like a cross between a collie and a greyhound. There were four papillons (little spaniels rechristened by the French because their alert bearing and erect ears reminded poetic fanciers of a butterfly). There was one blue-blooded pug, last survivor of a breed that once prowled in every lady's chamber. There were hundreds of airdales, Dobermann pinschers, sealinghams, Scotch terriers, bulldogs, griffons, sheepdogs, collies, setters, pointers, springer spaniels, foxhounds. But among them only a few received the accolade of a brave azure ribbon which, fluttering for a moment from a studded collar, denoted perfection of body, unchallengeable integrity of blood:

Champion Briarcroft Perfection, a solemn airdale, with the bearing of a cardinal and the fastidiousness of a jaguar. Bred by the Briarcroft Kennels, Erie, Pa.

Alaunts Double, a bulldog as scarred and seamed and magnetically ugly as a Prussian duelist. Owned by Lee & Rawes of Philadelphia. There was an even uglier dog in this class, Sensible Fred, owned by Thomas Grisdale of New York. But he was not quite so sound as Alaunts, and soundness, in a bulldog, is more important even than spectacular hideousness.

Trox Von Ulmeholz, a Dobermann pinscher who, in his slyness, his effeminacy, bore a subtle and not uncomplimentary resemblance to the onetime Crown Prince of Germany. Owned by F. E. Fischer of Leominster, Mass.

Seumas Cerina, a Kerry Blue terrier, owned by Mrs. William Randolph Hearst. A fine upstanding dog, but very rangy.

Valisan of Vladeska, Russian wolfhound, sheer white except for a black patch over his eye. He stalked negligently around the ring, content to give the rabble the privilege of seeing, for once, an aristocrat in ermine. J. Allen Dunn, novelist, judged this class, adeptly weeding out all those dogs which looked too much like the trademark of Publisher Alfred Knopf.

Laund Lero, a great collie, big-boned, deep-coated, thin in the groin and heavy in the chest. He was imported less than a year ago from England, where he had won five gold medals, three silver trophies, 68 blue ribbons. His color is mahogany sable. Owned by Mrs. Florence B. Ilch.

Aurora Borealis, a smooth St. Bernard, as faith-inspiring as an advertisement for a life insurance company. While the ribbon was being awarded him, he stared with massive tolerance at the judges as if he had thought of a scornful comment which, out of deference to their feelings, he would keep to himself. Bred by the Hercuveen Kennels.

All these were splendid, well-nigh perfect dogs. But when, on the second day, the winners in every breed paraded into the ring so that the judges could choose from among them a champion of champions, an Ace-King of the show, the grand prize went to none of these. It went to an obscure little white dog.

Signal Circuit, wire-haired fox terrier. Like a racehorse going to the barrier, he tripped springily beside Percy Roberts, a young Englishman who has trained him since his birth. His long squared muzzle and flat ears, splashed with tan, his tapering middle-piece, his front legs straight as the legs of a stool, his back-legs taut as triggers, showed him at once to be a prince. When the judges bent above him, probing with wise fingers the fabric on his bones, he stood very still; his garnet eyes were palled with a smoky sorrow. Then a great burst of clapping startled him. He looked up at Trainer Roberts, whose hand was outstretched to receive a blue ribbon. He doubtless thought that the applause was all for that great demigod, his trainer. He did not know, and possibly would not be enthusiastic if he should ever find out, that in that instant he himself had been adjudged the finest dog in the U. S.