TO THE MAKERS OF THIS BOOK 



On a Virginia day, the winter of 1863, a human 

 mite peeped through a fence of chestnut rails at 

 the concord of a redhot Confederate landowner 

 and a Federal officer over an old white setter and 

 a bevy of quail, — " bunch of pah'tridges," they 

 said. Every year since, the pupil has been under 

 the tuition of men who know sporting dogs. 

 Amateurs, professionals, scientists, market-hunt- 

 ers, dog-thieves, financiers, jurists, loafers, and 

 clubmen; Bluenoses, Tarheels, Hoosiers, Cana- 

 dians, Britishers, Germans, Populists, and Squaw- 

 men, — for the unfailing indulgence with which 

 they have diminished his ignorance, he tenders 

 acknowledgment. 



