THE DOG. 



AFTER the gun or rifle, the great essential, as to the 

 mere killing of game, is his dog to the sportsman ; but 

 when we regard him as the living, the intelligent, the 

 more than half-reasoning companion, the docile, obedient, 

 enduring, uncomplaining servant, the faithful, grateful, 

 submissive, affectionate friend, and not unseldom the last 

 mourner of the dead master, unmourned by all beside, 

 " when men have shrunk from the ignoble task of watch- 

 ing him who led them;" we must think of him as some- 

 thing widely different from the tool of wood and iron 

 which we fashion, how perfectly soever, merely to be the 

 senseless and unconscious instrument of our skill. 



The wonderful tractableness of the dog, his facil- 



