A PAIR OF RECUMBENT SPANIELS

W.R. Sargent (op. cit., p. 187) illustrates a very similar pair, but two different colors, from the Copeland collection, noting that this is the largest of several sizes spaniel models were made in for export, and suggesting that the iron-red type "...may specifically describe the Blenheim variety of spaniel which was presented to the Duke of Marlborough from China."
Other examples of this model were found on the wreck of the British East India Company ship Griffin, which sank around 1761.