REASON IN THE DOG. 253 



was about Lis handsome broad forehead and bright 

 yellow eyes an exi^ression that he was capable of 

 taking notice of anything if he was reasonably 

 taught that notice would be the first step to edu- 

 cation, and that education, agreeably administered, 

 would lead him to s2)ort and recreation. The first 

 rabbit he saw was in a trap, but no inducement 

 that I could offer would make him touch it. I killed 

 it myself, made him tliinh that I was fond of it, 

 and carried it about with me half the day, dropping 

 it occasionally, and picking it up again, caressing 

 him while I did so. At last he began to notice the 

 rabbit, and, to make a long tale short, he became 

 proud to carry home any rabbit I chanced to kill 

 in his presence. His mouth was very light, and he 

 could carry a rabbit all day and never hurt it. He 

 soon came, when a rabbit was shot at in cover, to go 

 and search for it, and had just begun his duty 

 as a retriever when the following circumstance 

 happened : — Some time in the night he contrived to 

 slip his collar ; he was chained to his house on the 

 lawn opposite the front door, and he might have 

 been at large all night ; but when I opened the front 

 door at breakfast-time to whistle up the pheasants 

 to their food, there lay Nep in his house in the 



