UPLAND SHOOTING. • 185 



18 a necessary accomplishment for a Setter or Pointer in this 

 country ; that it would be an advantage everywhere ; and that 

 a dog can be precisely as steady fetching every bird, as he can 

 if incapable of so doiuu-. 



i^ut ho must invariably be made, Ti^t only to down-charge, 

 but to point dead, before he is allowed to fetch. If the second 

 duty is neglected, it will be a very little while before the ani- 

 mal begins to nish in at every shot, without charging. 



One great difficulty here is, that no one in America having 

 gamekeepers, the hunting of the dog, so soon as he is turned 

 out of the breaker's hands, falls directly on the master — who is 

 very generally, even if himself a very passably good shot, unac- 

 quainted with the methods of dog-breaking, and unqualified by 

 his habits of life, for taking the trouble of going systematically 

 to work with the animal, so as to keep him up to all that he 

 knows, and to prevent him from either acquiring new bad tricks* 

 or neglecting his old teachings. It is scarcely too much to say, 

 that one half of the dogs in the United States, which go out of 

 the breaker's into the master's hands valuable brutes, are, at the 

 end of twelve months, worthless. 



I should strongly recommend young sportsmen, when pur- 

 chasing new dogs, to take an opportunity, if possible, of seeing 

 them himted several times by the breaker, and of endeavoring 

 to observe his peculiar modes of speech and action with the dog ; 

 and at all events to learn those points of education, on which 

 he insists, in order that tliey may guide themselves hi their own 

 conduct toward the animal thei-eby, and insist on the animal 

 acting in all respects up to his previous teaching. Old sports- 

 men, of course, have their own ways of having their dogs 

 trained, and on these they are so trained hefore buying them. 

 Another thing is worthy of observation — a dog never ought to 

 be lent. I would not lend my dog to a hetter sportsman than 

 myself — because no two sportsmen hunt their dogs, as I have 

 observed, exactly alike, and I wish my dog to hunt as I want 

 him to hunt, not better than he does, nor worse. It is impossi- 

 ble to imagine the difference of the intelligence of two dogs, 



