The English Setter. 317 



allowed to invade those lines. The various 

 families are strictly preserved, and the strong 

 family likeness, with the peculiar habits and 

 methods of working, and their power to transmit 

 those to others, justify, I consider, their title to 

 rank as a distinct breed, which fact is perhaps more 

 fully recognised in America than here." 



From time to time there have cropped up 

 other so-called strains of English setters, but they 

 have never possessed sufficiently distinguishing 

 features to entitle them to a name or classification 

 of their own. Personally, I have known more than 

 one breed that better deserved a position of their 

 own than some that strived to attain it. In West- 

 moreland, fifteen or twenty years ago, the shooting 

 men in the neighbourhood of Crosthwaite had black 

 setters, not more than forty pounds in weight, with 

 little coat and no lumber about them. They were 

 not of very great pace, because the small allotments 

 there were not suitable for fast dogs, but their noses 

 were excellent ; they required little training, and had 

 stamina enough to hunt every alternate day during 

 the season. I believe that in Wales there was a 

 similar strain of setter to this, which has likewise 

 been lost maybe by continual inbreeding. 



Another class of dog I saw in the north many 

 years ago was a pale red setter, with a double 



