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King
Charles II
This
decree is still in existence today in England. As time
went by, and with the coming of the Dutch Court, Toy
Spaniels went out of fashion and were replaced in popularity
by the Pug. One exception was the strain of red and
white Toy Spaniels that was bred at Blenheim Palace
by various Dukes of Marlborough. In the early days,
there were no dog shows and no recognized breed standard,
so both type and size varied. With little transport
available, one can readily believe that breeding was
carried out in a most haphazard way.
By the mid-nineteenth century, England took up dog breeding
and dog showing seriously. Many breeds were developed
and others altered. This brought a new fashion to the
Toy Spaniel - dogs with the completely flat face, undershot
jaw, domed skull with long, low set ears and large,
round frontal eyes of the modern King Charles Spaniel
(also called "Charlies" and known in the U.S. today
as the English Toy Spaniel).
As a result of this new fashion, the King Charles Spaniel
of the type seen in the early paintings became almost
extinct. It was at this stage that an American, Roswell
Eldridge, began to search in England for foundation
stock for Toy Spaniels that resembled those in the old
paintings, including Sir Edwin Landseer's "The Cavalier's
Pets." All he could find were the short-faced Charlies.
Eldridge persisted, persuading the Kennel Club in 1926
to allow him to offer prizes for five years at Crufts
Dog Show - twenty five pounds sterling for the best
dog and twenty five pounds sterling for the best bitch
- for the dogs of the Blenheim variets as seen in King
Charles II's reign.
No
one among the King Charles breeders took this challenge
very seriously as they had worked hard for years to
do away with the long nose. Gradually, as the big prizes
came to an end, only people really interested in reviving
the dogs as they once had been were left to carry on
the breeding experiment. At the end of five years little
had been achieved, and the Kennel Club was of the opinion
that the dogs were not in sufficient numbers, nor of
a single type, to merit n a breed registration separate
from the Charlies. In 1928, a dog owned by Miss Mostyn
Walker, Ann's Son, was awarded the prize (unfortunately,
Roswell Eldridge dies in 1928 at the age of 70, only
a month before Crufts, so he never saw the results of
his challenge prizes). It was in the same year that
a breed club was founded, and the name Cavalier King
Charles Spaniel was chosen. It was very important that
the association with the name King Charles Spaniel be
kept as most breeders bred back to the original type
by way of the long-faced throwouts from the kennels
of the short-faced variety breeders. Some of the stock
threw back to the long-faced variety very quickly.
Pioneers were often accused of using outcrosses to other
suitable breeds to get the long faces, but this was
not true, and crossing to other breeds was not recommended
by the club. At the first meeting of the club, held
the second day of Crufts in 1928, the standard breed
was drawn up; it was practically the same as it is today.
Ann's Son was placed on the table as the live example,
and club members brought all the reproductions of pictures
of the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries
they could muster. As this was a new and tremendous
opportunity to achieve a really worthwhile breed, it
was agreed that as far as possible, the Cavalier should
be guarded from fashion, and there was to be no trimming.
A perfectly natural dog was desired and was not to be
spoiled to suit individual tastes, or as the saying
goes, "carved into shape." Kennel Club recognition was
still withheld, and progress was slow, but gradually
people became aware that the movement toward the "old
type" King Charles Spaniel had come to stay. In 1945
the Kennel Club granted separate registration and awarded
Challenge Certificates to allow the Cavalier King Charles
Spaniel to gain their championships. |
