62 SECOND DIVISION OF THE 



the dog, and the consequent interference with the cropping and the diges- 

 tion of the food, he will attach more importance to the good temper of 

 the dog and of the shepherd than he has been accustomed to do. There 

 would be no injustice, or rather a great deal of propriety, in inflicting a 

 fine for every tooth-mark that could be detected. When the sheep, in- 

 stead of collecting round the dog, and placing themselves under his pro- 

 tection on any sudden alarm, uniformly fly from him with terror, the farmer 

 may be assured there is something radically wrong in the management of 

 the flock. 



Instinct and education combine to fit this dog for our service. The 

 pointer will act without any great degree of instruction, and the setter 

 will crouch ; and most certainly the sheep-dog, and especially if he has 

 the example of an older and expert one, will, almost without the teaching 

 of the master, become everything that can be wished, obedient to every 

 order, even to the slightest motion of the hand. There is a natural pre- 

 disposition for the office he has to discharge, which it requires little 

 trouble or skill to develop and perfect. 



It is no unpleasing employment to study the degree in which the several 

 breeds of dogs are not only highly intelligent, but fitted by nature for the 

 particular duty they have to perform. The pointer, the setter, the hound, 

 the greyhound, the terrier, the spaniel, and even the bull-dog, were made, 

 and almost perfected, by nature chiefly for one office alone, although they 

 may be useful in many other ways. This is well illustrated in the sheep- 

 dog. If he be but with his master, he lies content, indifferent to every 

 surrounding object, seemingly half asleep and half awake, rarely mingling 

 with his kind, rarely courting, and generally shrinking from, the notice 

 of a stranger ; but the moment duty calls, his sleepy, listless eye becomes 

 brightened ; he eagerly gazes on his master, inquires and comprehends all 

 he is to do, and, springing up, gives himself to the discharge of his duty 

 with a sagacity, and fidelity, and devotion, too rarely equalled even by 

 man himself. 



Mr. James Hogg, the Ettrick Shepherd, living in his early days 

 among the sheep and their quadruped attendants, and an accurate observer 

 of nature, as well as an exquisite poet, gives some anecdotes of the colley, 

 (the Highland term for sheep-dog,) with which the reader will not be 

 displeased. " My dog Sirrah," says he, in a letter to the Editor of Black- 

 wood's Edinburgh Magazine, " was, beyond all comparison, the best dog 

 I ever saw. He had a somewhat surly and unsocial temper, disdaining 

 all flattery, and refusing to be caressed ; but his attention to my commands 

 and interest will never again be equalled by any of the canine race. When 

 I first saw him, a drover was leading him with a rope. He was both lean 

 and hungry, and far from being a beautiful animal ; for he was almost 

 black, and had a grim face, striped with dark brown. I thought I per- 

 ceived a sort of sullen intelligence in his countenance, notwithstanding his 

 dejected and forlorn appearance, and I bought him. He was scarcely a 

 year old, and knew so little of herding that he had never turned a sheep 

 in his life ; but, as soon as he discovered that it was his duty to do so, and 

 that it obliged me, I can never forget with what anxiety and eagerness he 

 learned his different evolutions, and when I once made him understand a 

 direction he never forgot or mistook it." 



On one night, a large flock of lambs that were under the Ettrick Shep- 

 herd's care, frightened by something, scampered away in three different 



