8 The Sporting Dog 



the trials of 1903 have seen. They were the 

 beginning of the circuit. In the Manitoba Derby 

 were entered 46 setters and 16 pointers. The 

 all-age entries were 33 setters and 16 pointers. 

 In Nebraska the Derby had 52 setters and 26 

 pointers; the all-age stake 42 setters, one of them 

 Irish, and 24 pointers. If all had been pointers 

 or all setters, the difference would not have been 

 material, since either breed is, all in all, as good 

 as the other. But it makes a big difference 

 when an official report proclaims a fact which is 

 not a fact and draws a conclusion which is viti- 

 ated from the start. The subject was dogs and 

 the author set down carelessly a casual impres- 

 sion, formed nobody knows how. The studbooks 

 show a like preponderance of setters in private 

 hands. 



The English do these things better. Stone- 

 henge, not now up to date even with revision, 

 was an example of lucidity, judicial care, and 

 ripened observation worthy of an honored place 

 in any literature. Rawdon Lee was a later au- 

 thority of the same type. Even Mr. Lane, whose 

 chipper book is but three years old, possesses a 

 freedom from pseudo-literary affectation and a 

 wholesome sincerity of treatment which inspire 

 confidence in his message as far as it goes. 



Still, though we breed erratically and write 

 loosely, we undoubtedly have, in " class " of per- 



