126 SPORT IN EUROPE 



capture of animals, passionately. It is, however, true that my country- 

 men shoot for the pot rather than for sport, and will as a rule 

 overlook a fault in their dog so long as a wounded partridge or hare 

 does not get away. Our native pointers have shared the fate of the 

 game, and have disappeared. A few rare examples of esteemed 

 breeds are still in existence, and a society of breeders has existed 

 for some years in Normandy with the object of re-establishing these 

 breeds. No success, however, has crowned these efforts, which seem 

 to me to have been mere waste. 



As long as France was one of the best game countries in the 



world, these species of pointers seemed made for the land in which 



they had to do their work. Their shape showed that 



French speed was of no service to them, for there was no need 



Sporting 



Doffs ^^ ^^^^^ game at a distance. There was plenty of it 



close at hand, and the dog was used by its master to 

 recover wounded game rather than in finding it. The scent of our 

 native French dogs was by no means so good as that of the newer 

 breeds of pointers and setters, the chief use of which was to go 

 bounding over large areas to save their masters the trouble, seeking 

 game in countries in which it was the reverse of plentiful. 



As I have already mentioned, our French breeds, scattered by the 

 Revolution, have for nearly a century been crossed in the wildest 



fashion and to an extent facilitated by the increase of 



Effects means of communication. With the territorial estates, 



of the 



Revolution. ^^^ brachs and spaniels, reared with the greatest care 



in the castle kennels, became the property of the first 



comer. They were sent wandering through the country like wolves 



