PET ANIMALS. 339 



POINTERS, SETTERS, SPANIELS, RETRIEVERS, &c., are sporting 

 dogs ; though all very useful and faithful to their masters, they are 

 not, with an exception or two, such dogs as boys would select as 

 companions, though we could find a good deal to say about them, 

 were we writing a history of dogs, instead of merely skimming over 

 their different varieties to arrive at such as we do consider com- 

 paniable, and these are the English and Scotch terriers. 



A TERRIER is the dog a boy ought to have ; he will fetch and 

 carry, hunt vermin, guard the house, bark when you bid him, or be 

 mute in a moment a terrier is the dog for a boy, after all. Oh, 

 what a fellow he is for a rat ; won't he shake him and make him 

 squeak ; I wouldn't be a rat in the jaws of a good terrier, if I might 

 be made the Emperor of China to-morrow. Or let him get hold of a 

 stoat or a weasel, and he'll just show them as much mercy as they 

 show a poor little rabbit or hare. It's all up with them, I can tell 

 you ; and if they look into his eyes, they'll find no more pity there 

 than they would in a pebble. If he can't worry a hedgehog, he'll 

 make it "shake in its shoes," and even have a turn at a badger, 

 which is as sharp and close a biter as a bull-dog. Then the Scotch 

 terrier seems as fond of water as a fish : throw your stick in and he 

 dashes after it, comes paddling up with it in his mouth, and places 

 it at your feet. To say nothing of their playfulness, they are such 

 faithful animals too, and would follow their master to the end of the 

 world, and further, if he went there. Then they may be taught no 

 end of amusing tricks to beg, to walk on their hinder legs, to sit 

 up until you count any given number, to fetch anything you have 

 dropped purposely, and left a long while behind, if it has been 

 pointed out to them. And many a laughable anecdote is on record, 

 of their masters having thrown things away, which they had no 

 wish should be found in their possession, when, lo ! to their confu- 

 sion, the dog would come up with the rejected article in his mouth, 

 and place it at his master's feet, when the latter would have given 

 all he possessed to have been ten miles away another road at the 

 moment. We have heard of a man stealing a small bundle, throw- 

 ing it away when pursued, of the dog picking it up, and the thief 

 being captured, through the pursuers following the footsteps of the 

 faithful dog. Another man went to purchase a flock of sheep, which 

 his dog drove into a corner for him to examine, but as he could not 

 agree with the owner of the sheep about the price, he went away 

 without them. Not so the dog ; he had been set to drive them in a 

 corner by his master, and knowing nothing about the disagreement 

 respecting price, why he drove them out of the field to his master's 

 farm-house, which was ten long miles off. The dog's master was 

 tried for stealing the sheep, and had a very narrow escape. Two 

 tollgate keepers proved that the dog barked in the night until they 

 opened their gates and let the sheep through, thinking the master 

 was behind, but they found he was not, and this saved the man's 

 life, for sheep-stealing was punished with hanging in those days. 



Now, in keeping dogs, if they have kennels, always clean them 



