42 TRAINING vs. BREAKING. 



refrain from asking him to bring you anything that is hard 

 or bulky, at least until he has arrived at miturity and is well 

 established in all his lessons. Many good retrievers are 

 ruined by allowing them to bring articles that they are 

 obliged to grasp hard in order to hold on to. For this reason 

 we never allow our dog to bring our knife nor anything of the 

 kind, for just so sure as this is allowed just so sure will the 

 dog acquire the habit of pinching his birds. 



We once own? d one of the best retrievers that we ever 

 saw. In an evil hour we bade him carry into the house 

 the earthen plate from wh : ch he had eaten his dinner. 

 After this it became the regular thing for him to do at every 

 meal, but alas that dainty, delicate mouth, which had been 

 our pride and boast, was gone forever, and after this every bird 

 that he brought that was not stone dead, would show the 

 marks of his teeth. We are w^ell aware that there is a great 

 difference in dogs in this respect, and that we occasionally 

 see one that will bring anything that he can drag along and 

 at the same time he will hardly ruffle a feather of a strug- 

 gling bird ; but for fear that you may not possess such a para- 

 gon we advise you to be very careful about trying any ex- 

 periments that may ruin your dog, especially when there is 

 no practical benefit to be derived that is at all commensurate 

 with the risk that you run. Your hat and gloves and slip- 

 pers, you can safely allow him to bring you, and it will take 

 but little time to teach him this if you carefully follow the 

 instructions that we have given. You can even teach him 

 by constant practice to distinguish between them so that 

 when you send him for either one he will make no mistake, 

 but, understanding your order, bring the article you v^i;h. 

 In order to teach him this you should first accustom him to 

 bring each article and at the same time to take pains to teach 

 him its name. Take, for instance, your hat, and after plac- 

 ing it in his mouth, bid him "bring the hat," and be sure 

 to use the same language every time that you practice him 

 at this. The same course should be pursued with the gloves 

 or any other article that you may wish. After he has had 

 practice enough to bring readily the article des'red you can 



