SIR,

THE

HE subject of the ensuing Thoughts and Remarks-viz. the Breeding and Training of Setters and Pointers-has been unequivocally condemned by more than one modern writer as a subject utterly unworthy of illustration or attention, for no other or better reason than that it is "not new*," and that "it has been written beforet." Highly as I estimate both these authorities, I am not singular in asserting that I do not coincide altogether in the opinion, however decidedly expressed; and further I may say, that if every topic which is not new, or which has been written before, was to be consigned to the "tomb of all the Capulets," what would become of the whole race of producers and purveyors for the press down from the Great Unknown that was, to the printer's devil that ever will be unknown? Solomon said in his day that nothing was new; but I do not think that "the wisest man the warl e'er saw," though "he dearly loved the lasses," had ever seen a steam-boat or a percussion gun-to say nothing of a setting dog. The last, however, is not new in our time: but allow me to say that this round world does not stand still, and that there is even now, in this our day, such a thing as a rising generation, whose ardent and inquiring minds on topics that interest them renders all new to them, and who are daily succeeding the old hands, whose "absolute wisdom" may induce them to look with

* Colonel Hawker.

contempt, or utter disdainful inattention, on any fresh attempt to illustrate the subject.

Such a young one, taking up your Magazine, may find what most likely may amuse, and possibly instruct him. If he is already a shooter, he cannot by intuition have attained all at once that insight which experience alone affords, or even that theoretical knowledge to be acquired by books. Perhaps he may never have read a word on the subject, or even yet burnt powder: in either case he may cause his attention to be directed to the consideration of many matters which otherwise may have been, or might be, the sources of much mortification, if not actual defeat. Surely it may be said, without any great imputation of arrogance or assumption, that to such, just entering on their shooting career, a little dissertation on this head will not be altogether devoid of interest or utility. Round in the tusk as I am, alas! getting, it was your Miscellany which first fell into my hands and set me all agog-a stimulus, thank Heaven! yet unabated. Yet, after twentytwo years' successive experience, Ihumbly acknowledge that every year I find I have something yet to learn-something new to me, which had not previously suggested itself, or been observed. Men are much the same in all ages and times, though fashions vary; and, judging of the past from my own case, it is not very unreasonable to infer something + GILBERT FORESTER. B

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similar of others in the future. It would be the acme of presumption and impertinence to advance, that the ensuing remarks and suggestions can any way, much less altogether, supply the deficiencies or obviate the errors, which, with great submission, I cannot help saying appear to me to exist and occur in most works on this subject. I utterly disclaim such preposterous and disgusting vanity but I feel confident that they will point out and explain much that is worthy of minute attention, and even exhibit in some particulars-especially on one of the most important, in making a perfect setter or pointer, that of being thoroughly steady from hare--something original; while the whole system of breaking will be taken and considered in a different view and on different principles (to a certain degree) from that which is estimated the common and only one at present. When I say a perfect setter or pointer, I do it in the conviction, resulting from ample experience, that every dog may (as regards teaching) be so made and considered, as far as his natural qualifications and abilities will permit him to claim the title. No one animal hardly coincides with another in this particular. But to read the works on this topic generally, one would be led to imagine that it was a necessary consequence that every whelp should be formed of the precise self-same material, that every one had first-rate stuff to work upon ; or when it is alluded to, and your dog supposed to be a little hard or soft in the temper, you are, in either case, advised to resort to a halter, or a charge of powder and shot; and this after you have been

at the trouble and expense of rearing-to say nothing of the time lost (a thing irremediable); or perhaps after having triumphed over that fell destroyer, the Distemper: whereas, if you have game and ground to resort to, both may be overcome, in almost every instance, by judicious perseverance. And let me add (and I am every day more strengthened in my opinion), whatever may be said about hard tempers, that dogs of a tender one, possessed (and they generally are) of other good qualities, make by far the best and most comfortable dogs, when wrought up and hardened into confidence. Many a mamma's darling, subjected to the severe ordeal of a public school, has at first proved but a puling urchin, but who, when seasoned, has gallantly doffed his tile and fleshbag, and fought like a Liliputian Dutch Sam. The same holds good with the canine whelps. Breed as carefully or as well as we can, it is not every day or year that we can get hold of a firstrate whelp-one who inherently possesses "all that may become a" dog. What this all amounts to in the aggregate is no trifle : a pointer or setter, to deserve the name, should hunt high, but steadily; quarter his ground with truth and judgment; turn to hand or whistle; drop to hand, bird, and shot; back at all distances; be steady from hare, yet follow a wounded one if necessary; and recover a dead or wounded bird well-all which, I can confidently say, may to a certain extent be attained in dogs of all dispositions by the methods hereafter attempted to be inculcated, as I have proved by ten years' successive and successful execution.

66

THE inherent and indomitable spirit for field sports (which age cannot tire nor custom dull" -and so may it ever continue!) characterised the Aborigines of this Island at the time of the Roman invasion. The sport of hawking, unknown to the Romans, who were at that time masters of nearly all the then world, was in practice among the Britons, from whom the Romans adopted it. Whether it existed among the Parthians (now Persia), where at present it is carried on in high perfection, we have no data to determine; but in Britain it did. Like all other civilized people, however, the Romans perceived that it was capable of improvement, and the principal auxiliaries which they summoned to their aid were the land and water spaniel, which dogs they introduced into this Island in the reign of the Emperor Vespasian. The land spaniel which they imported, most probably from Spain-whence, at a period many centuries subsequently, came the pointer-could (from the sport he was designed for) be no other than the largest of the springing spaniel species-such dogs as are yet to be seen in the large woodlands of Kent and Sussex, and such as we see precisely represented in the act of springing in all the old paintings (and prints in the old works) upon hawking. A setting dog for this sport was useless; a springer or water spaniel was necessary. It would be superfluous to allude to what a length of time the sport of hawking prevailed, or the perfection it was carried to: suffice it for our purpose, that, like most sublunary matters, it declined, and at length

nearly became extinct. The principal cause of its extinction was the net. The springer, doubtless, was made use of at first for the net, much in the same way as the dog of the present day acts in a decoy; but as there is a kind of pause inherent in most dogs who getat their game by the scent, when age and practice have made them cunning, it most probably suggested itself to some of the more ardent and ingenious, that this part of their instinct might be improved, and at length perfected.

But that the dog, called by us the "Old English Setter"-the dog which the use of the net brought ultimately into play as hawking declined among our ancestors was not at the outset a distinct breed, as it afterwards became, there are almost positive and absolute grounds for assuming. I know (as I shall afterwards mention) that many hold a different opinion; but I shall proceed to what I consider proof. In an old black-letter Dictionary of Rural Sportswhether by Gervase Markham or not it is impossible to say, as neither the author nor the date of its publication can be ascertained, the title-page being wantingunder the head "Setting Dog," is the following:-"A dog trained up to the setting of partridges, from a whelp until he cometh to perfection, you must pitch upon one that hath a perfect good scent, and who is naturally addicted to the hunting of fowl. This dog may be either a land or water spaniell; or a mongrell between both; or indeed the small shallow flued hound or bastard mastiff: he should be of a good

nimble size, and of courageous mettle, of a breed known to be strong, lusty, and nimble rangers, of active feet, wanton tails, and busy nostrills." Now the blackletter work whence this is extracted shews it to have been one of the earliest on this subject; and what a variety to compound a dog out of does it not represent! Surely if the land spaniel had possessed all the necessary qualifications for a setting dog, no men would have set about compounding from such a number of varieties, or embarked on the ocean of speculation, the results of which they could look to with no certainty, had Nature made the animal they wanted ready to their hand. Now it must be allowed that to "get active feet, wanton tails, and busy nostrills," a better animal could not be selected than the land spaniel or large springer; which being in possession of, it became a desideratum to obtain the stop; and what animal could present itself more forcibly than the stop hound? Now, whether this was the deep or "shallow flued" hound abovementioned, it is not very easy to ascertain. I think, if my memory deceives me not, Gervase Markham mentions them as a distinct hound: at all events there were such hounds; and that they were in use as late as the reign of Queen Anne, a reference to The Spectator, No. 116, will testify. "The huntsman, getting forward, threw down his pole before the dogs. They were now within eight yards of that game which they had been pursuing almost as many hours; yet on the signal before mentioned they all made a sudden stand, and though they continued opening as much as before, durst not once attempt to pass beyond the pole." Now across

from the spaniel and a hound capable of such instruction and restraint is at least as probable a derivation as we can conceive.

"The small bastard mastiff" is also mentioned. I once saw a mastiff in the mountains of Galway in Ireland, who among a broken pack of grouse would give you a steady shot at every bird in it; and there is at present in this neighbourhood a cur or coly bitch, belonging to a shepherd, that would take the shine out of many a dog that is called a pointer. I think it probable, therefore, that the very early breeders might resort for a cross to any dog who shewed an inclination to point.

Having traced the genus to sources at least by no means improbable, it may not be uninteresting to endeavour to shew whence the old English setter derived its prevalent colours. They were brown and white, commonly called liver and white, red and white, and red-all others are new varieties. The brown, and liver and white, would proceed from the spaniel; the red and white, and red, from the hound. Markham and all other old authors inform us, "that your red and white, and red, hound is generally of a cold melancholy phlegmatic disposition, with staunch and tender noses, and very painful;" which quaint term of course means painstaking. Nothing can be more natural to suppose than that people who went about as it were to originate a particular animal for such a specific purpose, would reasonably result to the obvious inherent qualities of these painful red and whites. The red colour leads to another consideration. There is in Ireland to this day a breed of dogs designated in