338 FRANK FORESTER S FIELD SPORTS. 



best restorative ; and that is the only time when I approve of 

 straw for a bed, as it is heating, and has a strong tendency to 

 harbor vermin. To curry a dog, or comb him with a horse's 

 mane comb, and then brush him thoroughly, will be found to 

 contribute to his cleanliness, comfort, and health, in a far higher 

 degree, than the trouble of seeing it done will incommode the 

 sportsman. A little method, and the regular observance of 

 hours, will render all these things easy, and they will soon come 

 to be regarded by the servant as matters of every day occur- 

 rence, and as such to be done, and the trouble disregarded. 



With regard to feeding, a question on which very much of the 

 condition, and not a little of the olfactory powers of the dog, 

 Mr. Blaine in his great work on Canine Pa hology, asks the fol- 

 lowing ques'tion, and proceeds forthwith to answer it. 



" IVhat is the hest food for dogs 1 An examination of this ani- 

 mal must end in determining that he is neither wholly carnivo- 

 rous, nor wholly herbivorous, but of a mixed kind ; intended to 

 take in as well vegetable as animal matter, and formed to re- 

 ceive nourishment from either. He is furnished with sharp cut- 

 ting teeth for tearine flesh, and he has also tolerably broad sur- 

 faces on other of his teeth, capable of grinding farinaceous sub- 

 stances : his stomach and intestines likewise hold a middle place 

 between those of the carnivorous and herbivorous tribes. At 

 the same time, both his dental and his digestive organs appear 

 rather more adajsted to the mastication and assimilation of ani- 

 mal than vegetable matter; to which also his habits and partia- 

 lities evidently tend. He is by nature predacious, and intended 

 to live on other animals ; the stronger he hunts in troops, the 

 weaker he conquers singly. Yet still it is clear that his organs 

 fit him, when necessary, for receiving nutriment from vegetable 

 matter also, and we likewise see that he voluntarily seeks it, 

 probably as a necessary mixture, to prevent that tendency to 

 putridity, which too great a quantity of animal food begets. It 

 is a received opinion among many sportsmen, that flesh-feeding 

 injures the scent ; but it cannot do it naturally : for the fox, one 

 of the cLuiiiue, which is kno\\Ti to be by choice ^\ holly carnivu- 



