224 ANIMAL ARTISANS 



several breeds of dog which carry the tail low when a 

 little older. 



Puppies offer the best, and almost the only, study 

 of family life open to us among animals. There are 

 as many characters and individualities in a litter of 

 average setter puppies as in a family as large as that 

 described in the " Daisy Chain," and there is this ad- 

 vantage, that they are "all twins" and start level, and 

 do not take a lifetime to develop in. 



Not only to those " in the fancy," but to any sympa- 

 thetic person, and especially to children, even to those 

 no longer in the nursery, the excellent differences of 

 puppies, their gifts and tendencies, growth and develop- 

 ment, are clear, attractive, and intensely exciting. There 

 are those who pretend to be able to prophesy about them 

 before their eyes are open. Such persons will take the 

 snub-nosed, sleek, round-bellied, whimpering little 

 atoms and lay them in pairs to sprawl on a bench, 

 and after picking them up one by one with the finger 

 and thumb by the backs of their fat little necks, so 

 that they squeal worse than ever and put their tongues 

 out, will deliver themselves on the prospects of this 

 one being a grand dog, and that a sagacious and most 

 promising-looking female. All the time the person 

 who ought to know most about them, their anxious 

 mother, remains in a state of mingled anxiety and 

 pride pride that the gentlemen should take so much 

 notice of them, and anxiety for fear they may be 

 dropped. Two infallible rules for detecting early 

 promise are believed in by those to whom the canine 

 nursery mysteries are familiar, and who are making an 



