278 Modern Dogs. 



then have been employed as " sitting or crouching 

 to the game he found." 



That the spaniel was well known earlier than 

 the middle of the sixteenth century, and dogs of a 

 certain kind were used for finding birds, under 

 somewhat similar conditions as are observed to-day, 

 long prior to the introduction of firearms, there is no 

 doubt whatever. 



First of all, such dogs as spaniels were trained 

 to find birds at which the falconer flew his hawks. 

 Strutt, in his " Sports and Pastimes," quotes from a 

 fourteenth century manuscript, in the reign of 

 Edward III., father of the Black Prince. This old 

 writer, and interesting antiquarian, says the spaniel 

 was of use in hawking, "hys crafte is for the perdrich, 

 or partridge, and the quaile ; and when taught to 

 couche he is very serviceable to those who take 

 these birds with nets." This is the earliest allusion 

 I can find to trained dogs so nearly approaching in 

 their work the broken setter and pointer of modern 

 times. 



The spaniel must have been a steady, highly- 

 trained dog even then, and this taking of game by 

 nets is, in some localities, unhappily, still practised 

 by the poacher, especially at night time, when a 

 lighted lantern is fixed on the dog's back. The blaze 

 enables the poacher to see his dog, which, stand- 



