BREAKING AND HANDLING. 91 



new whip was worn out on him ; but before the afternoon 

 ended he would point. It might seem as if such severity 

 was unnecessary, but, severe though it was, its effects were 

 transient. It was necessary to keep a checkcord on him 

 all summer, and, had his merits been ordinary, he would 

 not have been worth the trouble of training. The whip- 

 pings had to be repeated day after day during the whole 

 season, till at last he would work steadily through combined 

 habit and fear, although he never did become reliable. 

 Even when trained, in his second season, if one fault was 

 permitted to pass unpunished, he rapidly thereafter became 

 unmanageable. Whipping never cowed him, and only had 

 transient beneficial effects. A good thrashing before he 

 was cast off in the morning always had salutary effects ; 

 if not given then, it would be necessary shortly afterward. 

 A dog of a colder nature never lived. He was naturally a 

 self-hunter, and only hunted to the gun as a matter of 

 arbitrary routine. Moral suasion would be as completely 

 lost on him as would a puff of breath into vacuity. 



In applying punishment with the whip for faults in field 

 work, due attention must be paid to contingent circum- 

 stances, ones which perhaps may require the fault to be un- 

 noticed. For instance, a dog might willfully flush a bevy, 

 and immediately thereafter might point an out-lying bird ; 

 if punished then, he is quite as likely to consider that the 

 punishment was inflicted for pointing as for flushing. Sim- 

 ple as this seems, there are many amateurs who will riot 

 consider such circumstances, notwithstanding the bad 

 effects which ensue. By disregarding such essentials, or 

 not even considering them, a great deal of unnecessary and 

 injurious punishment is inflicted, and complications pro- 

 duced. Skillful trainers always use the whip or collar 

 much less than amateurs. The latter are always disposed 

 to apply excessive punishment from assuming that every 



