Bull dogs

Illustration of a man walking his dogs from 'London: a Pilgrimage' by Blanchard Jerrold and Gustave Doré, 1872. The Bulldog Club was formed a few years after the book was published, in 1875. An article in 'The Times' for Thursday 11 December 1879 reports on the fifth show held by the Club, which was to have taken place in the Oriental Rooms, Blackfriars, but an injunction was taken out which forced a change of location: "The supporters of this peculiarly and distinctively English breed of dogs had, thus, at the eleventh hour, to find another locality for the exhibition, and have held their show ... at a warehouse at Rutland Wharf, in Thames-street. By his friends the bulldog is said not to merit the determined hostility with which he has been encountered by the Chancery Division of the High Court of Justice or those who set its procedure in motion. It is admitted he is an excitable animal, and that when he does become angry his powers of annoyance are very great. He has, for instance, a natural instinct to fly at the head of every being to which he conceives a dislike, and to remain there steadily fixed, without regard to any chastisement which may be inflicted on himself. In the old days he used thus to hang on by the nose of the bull, which the bulldog was trained to creep up on his belly and to bait." Bull baiting had been a popular sport in England for centuries, but had been made illegal in 1835.