CHARACTER OF THE DOG. 05 



object that flies from them, have a disposition to 

 chase sheep. A single timely correction is suf- 

 ficient to cure this; but when a dog once 

 indulges in sheep killing by stealth, the chain 

 becomes an imperfect check upon the habit, and 

 it is advisable, in all cases, to subject him to far- 

 mer's law. A popular English writer has said: 

 "in the human mind, ill regulated, there is a 

 dark desire for the forbidden;" the same remark, 

 in certain cases, is applicable to the dog. Among 

 all the instances which have come under our 

 notice, we remember but one in which the ani- 

 mal was influenced by necessity, and not from 

 choice. The nearer the dog approaches to purity 

 in stock, the nobler is his character, and the less 

 he is addicted to evil ways. 



We have never heard the clean bred pointer 

 accused of sheep killing. The setter is not so 

 free from taint. Indeed, he has been known, in 

 one instance, at least, to forsake his professional 

 business and assail a flock of sheep, which has 

 come in his way in the course of a day's sport. 

 This dog, said to have been an imported English 

 stock, unaccountably left his master, in the 

 stubbles, and a few minutes afterwards was 

 actually seen, by the proprietor of the land, 

 throttling sheep in an adjoining field. The man 



