ENGLISH SETTERS 141 



one peculiar dog called Dan. He stood over 27 inches at the 

 shoulder, and had more bone than any foxhound. This setter 

 won the Champion Stake at the National Field Trials in 1871. 

 His chief merits were that he was very fast without distressing 

 himself, and his tremendous strength and stride enabled him 

 to go round fast small ones without appearing to be trying, 

 and meantime to flick his stern as only those going within their 

 powers can. Setter breeding was revolutionised when this dog 

 was bred to the best bitches of Mr. Laverack's sort. 



Mr. Laverack's dogs in the sixties were known mostly upon 

 the show bench ; but what was then less well recognised was 

 that no dogs had done harder work upon the moors for many 

 canine generations. They were said to be in-bred to only two 

 animals on all sides of this pedigree, and to go back seventy 

 years without any cross whatever. It is probable that Mr. 

 Laverack had forgotten what crosses he did make ; but in any 

 case he crossed with the black-white-and-tan Gordons of Lord 

 Lovat's kennel, and whether he kept the offspring or not, there 

 was generally a trace of tan about the cheeks of his black-and- 

 white ticked dogs. In any case, his dogs were very much in- 

 bred, until some of them suddenly came liver- and-white in one 

 litter, and red, and black, whole-coloured in another. None of 

 the latter were allowed to mix with the Rhcebe and Duke 

 strain of setters, and indeed these were only crossed with the 

 blood named above, and with that of John Armstrong's Dash II., 

 a son of a Laverack setter dog, and descended from a bitch 

 said to be a sister of that Duke mentioned above. From this 

 limited material in point of numbers, but of three distinct 

 strains of blood, the finest setters of modern times were pro- 

 duced, including many that won principal honours of the show 

 and also of the field trials. In England they took most of 

 the field trials for setters for some years, and in America they 

 took all stakes that were open to both pointers and setters for 

 even longer. To apportion the merit amongst the original 

 three strains would be difficult, but as the setter breeding of the 

 future depends on a proper understanding of that of the past, 

 some few remarks may be of use. First, it has to be admitted 



