The colour, size, and shape of the original terriers are not indicated by the early writers, and art supplies but vague and uncertain evidence.  Nicholas Cox, who wrote of sporting dogs in The Gentleman’s Recreation (1667), seems to suggest that the type of working terrier was already fixed sufficiently to be divided into two kinds, the one having shaggy coats and straight limbs, the other smooth coats and short bent legs.  Yet some years later another authority—­Blome—­in the same publication was more guarded in his statements as to the terrier type when he wrote:  “Everybody that is a fox hunter is of opinion that he hath a good breed, and some will say that the terrier is a peculiar species of itself.  I will not say anything to the affirmative or negative of the point.”

Searching for evidence on the subject, one finds that perhaps the earliest references to the colours of terriers were made by Daniel in his Field Sports at the end of the eighteenth century, when he described two sorts, the one rough, short-legged, and long-backed, very strong, and “most commonly of a black or yellowish colour, mixed with white”—­evidently a hound-marked dog; and another smooth-coated and beautifully formed, with a shorter body and more sprightly appearance, “generally of a reddish brown colour, or black with tanned legs.”

Gilpin’s portrait of Colonel Thornton’s celebrated Pitch, painted in 1790, presents a terrier having a smooth white coat with a black patch at the set-on of the undocked tail, and black markings on the face and ears.  The dog’s head is badly drawn and small in proportion; but the body and legs and colouring would hardly disgrace the Totteridge Kennels of to-day.  Fox-terriers of a noted strain were depicted from life by Reinagle in The Sportsman’s Cabinet, published over a hundred years ago; and in the text accompanying the engraving a minute account is given of the peculiarities and working capacities of the terrier.  We are told that there were two breeds:  the one wire-haired, larger, more powerful, and harder bitten; the other smooth-haired and smaller, with more style.  The wire-hairs were white with spots, the smooths were black and tan, the tan apparently predominating over the black.  The same writer states that it was customary to take out a brace of terriers with a pack of hounds, a larger and a smaller one, the smaller dog being used in emergency when the earth proved to be too narrow to admit his bigger companion.  It is well known that many of the old fox hunters have kept their special breeds of terrier, and the Belvoir, the Grove, and Lord Middleton’s are among the packs to which particular terrier strains have been attached.