Other Retrievers. 395 



piece of tissue paper without soiling it in the least. 

 But such dogs as these have taken naturally to their 

 work, and no amount of training would persuade or 

 teach them to do what they like to perform of their 

 own accord. 



One of the best retrievers I ever owned was a 

 sorry looking customer a cross between a badly 

 bred collie dog and an illegitimate retriever slut. 

 His curly tail would have been a credit to an 

 Esquimaux. But a dog does not carry a bird or a 

 hare with his stern, nor does his intelligence lie 

 therein. Although the dog (l Dick" was not more than 

 forty pounds weight, and had a small head and jaw, 

 he could carry two rabbits easily. This he did often 

 enough when I happened to be shooting with a 

 friend, and a couple of rabbits had been stopped 

 simultaneously by smart first barrels. Dick was so 

 jealous that he persisted in bringing both to his 

 master. 



To prove the general uses an intelligent well- 

 trained retriever may be put to, it may not be out 

 of place to mention that quite recently a very 

 mongrel-looking specimen of the breed figured in a 

 most interesting fashion in a London police-court. 

 A man was charged with having sundry umbrellas in 

 his possession of which he could give no satisfactory 

 account. It was alleged that he had trained his dog 



