46 The Sporting Dog 



finds birds, the gun may be kept idle for many 

 precious minutes just at the time when shooting 

 luck would be otherwise at high tide. Most quail 

 shots will support me when I say that these 

 supreme shooting moments are very likely to 

 occur about dusk. This fact is, of course, due to 

 the well-known habits of the birds. To lose sight 

 of a dog at such a moment means often a profit- 

 less day. The orange-and-white dog has a de- 

 cided advantage as a self-supplying signal of 

 whereabouts. 



My bitch, Chiquita, during the two seasons 

 w^hen she was under my observation, was a fre- 

 quent source of irritation. She was one of the 

 greatest of bird finders, as field trial men in the 

 central West can attest. In truth she had too 

 much of that quality for comfort, since she was 

 more intent upon game than upon the gun, and it 

 was not an unusual thing for her to disappear in 

 the direction of a " birdy " place, to be found 

 after diligent search a half-hour later, stanchly 

 holding a covey. The upper part of her body 

 was nearly all black, and one could almost step on 

 her without recognition when she was on point ; 

 especially, as like most other dogs, she would 

 sink nearer and nearer to the ground the longer 

 she held birds. If she got into a corn-field, with 

 its occasional stump and its frequent spots of 

 black fungus on the stalks, I have known her to 



