n8 British Dogs. 



fathers. If his footing upon British soil cannot be traced back so far as 

 the setter's or, at least, as the setter has existed amongst us in some 

 form or another still, he seems to have been bred in this country for the 

 purpose for which he is now used, and for that alone. In France, 

 America, Spain, and Portugal he is also used for sporting purposes. 



He has always, as far as I can ascertain, been considered in England a 

 distinct breed of dog, cultivated for finding game by scent, and trained to 

 " pointing " it when found- i.e.. to come to a standstill upon scenting it. 

 So innate is this propensity to point in a well bred puppy of this breed 

 that we frequently see him point the first time he is entered to game. 

 This is regarded by some sportsmen as evidence of an original disposition 

 to point peculiar to this breed, but all the information that I have 

 obtained on this matter goes to show that it was first only the result of 

 training, and now exists more as a communicated habit than anything 

 else. It is advanced in favour of the pre-disposition theory that the 

 setter has been bred, trained, and used for precisely the same purpose, 

 yet he does not exhibit this quality spontaneous pointing in anything 

 like the same degree. It is a fact that the pointer does, as a rule, take 

 to pointing much earlier in his training, but the cause of this I must 

 leave for others to decide. 



The pointer, however different in form to what he now is, and in spite 

 of the many crosses to which he has been subjected, seems to have 

 experienced very little change in his leading characteristics. The 

 crossing him with other dogs, which at various times has been tried, has 

 not eradicated the " stamp " peculiar to his breed; neither is it evident 

 that the object sought by infusing into his veins blood foreign to him 

 was so much to change his character as to introduce qualities that it was 

 thought he might with advantage possess. By this I mean that it was 

 not so much to produce, by crossing with other breeds, a dog to do the 

 pointer's work, as to render him more suitable to the work which he was, 

 through change of circumstances, required to perform. In most cases, I 

 believe, first crosses have proved failures, whether with foxhound or 

 other dog. The foreign blood thus imported had to be diluted (if I may 

 use the expression) by crossing back again with the pointer, before even 

 so good a dog as the pure pointer was produced. " Droppers ' ' for such 

 is the name given to the produce of the first cross between pointer and 

 setter are, in some few instances, fairly good ; but they are no improve- 



