[ London Times ]
This newspaper, most correctly known simply as The Times, began publication in 1785 and continues to this day.
The October 2, 1873 edition of The Times published a substantial obituary on Sir Edwin Landseer, who died the day before. Because of the length of this obituary, only the mentions of Newfoundlands are presented here.
The first mention is an error. The author of the obituary mentions an 1823 painting by Landseer entitled The Watchful Sentinel, though it is better known by the title it acquired when engraved and printed: The Angler's Guard. The writer remarks that work "represents a large brown and white Newfoundland dog and a white Italian greyhound seated and keeping strict watch and ward over a fishing rod and basket." The image is available here at the Victoria and Albert Museum, where you can see that neither of the dogs is in fact seated (both are laying down) and the large brown-and-white dog looks as much like a St. Bernard as it does a Newf, though of course breed characteristics weren't as "established" back then as they are todayu.
In several lengthy lists of Landseer's most notable works are mentioned (without comment) A Distinguished Member of the Humane Society, Saved, and The Twa Dogs.
At one point the author notes Landseer "was deservedly called 'the Shakespeare of the world of dogs,'" and remarks that "His paintings are well known in the household of every educated man through the length and breadth of the land."
A few days later, on October 8, 1873, The Times would reprint, from the popular weekly magazine Punch, a poem honoring Sir Edwin Landseer. The poem alludes to a number of Landseer's more well-known paintings, and includes the following general reference to his Newfoundland works:
Up, with St. Bernard's searchers of the snow,
The good monks' good dogs, in the drifts was he;
Or, where the wild white horses, foaming, go,
With brave Newfoundland saving life from sea.