UPLAND SnOOTIN(7. 233 



on the pleasant and exciting pursuit of this beaut' ful little bird. 



From the greater difficulty of finding and killing Quail, it 

 follows of course that a greater combination of (jualities in the 

 dog with which we hunt them is recjuired. 



For Snipe or Woodcock shooting, the latter especially, 

 which is pursued in very close covert for the most part, we 

 require only a dog with good hunting qualities, under excellent 

 command, broke to hunt extremely close to his master, and 

 never to go beyond the range of his sight. Indeed if he do not 

 hang upon the stale scents, and potter where birds have been 

 but are not, a dog for Woodcock shooting can hardly be too 

 slow or too steady. 



Now all these qualities are essential likewise to the Quail 

 dog, and without these qualiti(>s the sportsman can have no 

 success wluMi he has attained the first object of his mornino;'s 

 work, tlu" driving and scattering his birds from open grain or 

 grass fields into covert wherein they will lie hard, and rise 

 singly, which constitute the only circumstances under which, 

 north of the Delaware and Potomac, it is possible to bag many 

 Quail. 



Yet this is far from all that we require in a Quail dog ; for 

 as we are compelled to seek for our birds in the open feeding 

 grounds, while they are running in the early morning, and as 

 our day's sport mainly depends on finding a considerable num- 

 ber of birds during that short time, which ends at the latest, by 

 ten o'clock in the morning, and earlier in warm, sunny days, it 

 follows that the more ground we can get over in a given time, 

 the greater the chance of success. 



We retpire therefore that our brace of dogs while beating 

 open ground should have dash and speed enough to run almost 

 like foxhounds on a breast-high scent, heads up and stems 

 down, quarteiing the field from fence to fence in opposite direc- 

 tions and crossing each other midway — that they should be so 

 staunch and steady as to allow the shooter to come up to them 

 from five or six hundred yards' distance, without breaking their 

 point — and lastly that they should be under command so perfect 



