BREAKING AND HANDLING. 189 



persists in pointing them to an offensive degree, the whip 

 may be liberally applied at every repetition until he will 

 blink them, the effects, however, being noted and governed 

 with reference to the performance on game birds; for in 

 being broken from hunting one he might be broken from 

 hunting all. By showing approval and praising him when 

 game birds are pointed, and disapproval and punishment 

 when larks are pointed, the trouble generally may be 

 avoided. Pointing rabbits can be corrected in a similar 

 manner. Nearly all dogs will point turtles, snakes, etc., but 

 so rarely, owing to the scarcity of such animals, that no 

 notice need be taken of it. In teaching the dog to work to 

 the gun, it is well to remember that the pointing instinct is 

 not specially implanted in the dog's nature for the benefit 

 of some man to shoot at the pointed bird with a gun ; and 

 that if the gun were not present the act would be incomplete 

 and meaningless. 



It is commonly supposed that false pointing is caused by 

 an inferior nose. Dogs possessing the best of noses will 

 exhibit the fault at times, particularly when excessively 

 fatigued. It may be caused temporarily by severe punish- 

 ment for flushing, in which event it disappears in time if the 

 cause is not perpetuated. If a dog is naturally a confirmed 

 false pointer, there is no remedy for it; such faulty act 

 being probably from inability to distinguish between scents, 

 or an abnormal development of the pointing instinct. If it 

 is shown occasionally, ignore the point as much as possible. 

 Punishment aggravates the fault. 



The amateur invariably over-estimates the harmfulness of 

 flushes in early training, generally because he is more intent 

 on shooting than on dog training; many times the dog is 

 punished, not for the flush, but for the lost shot. If the 

 trainer wishes to know the true value of a flush, let him 

 leave his gun at home, and thus the cause of his anxiety 



