THE SPORTING SPANIEL 149 



English literature is contained in the celebrated " Master of 

 Game," the work of Edward Plantagenet, second Duke of 

 York, and Master of Game to his uncle, Henry IV., to whom 

 the work is dedicated. It was written between the years 

 1406 and 1413, and although none of the MSS., of which some 

 sixteen are in existence, is dated, this date can be fairly 

 accurately fixed, as the author was appointed Master of Game 

 in the former and killed at Agincourt in the latter year. His 

 chapter on Spaniels, however, is mainly a translation from the 

 equally celebrated " Livre de Chasse," of Gaston Comte de 

 Foix, generally known as Gaston Phoebus, which was written 

 in 1387, so that we may safely assume that Spaniels were well 

 known, and habitually used as aids to the chase both in France 

 and England, as early as the middle of the fourteenth century. 



In the eighteenth and early part of the nineteenth century 

 the Spaniel was described by many writers on sporting subjects ; 

 but there is a great similarity in most of these accounts, each 

 author apparently having been content to repeat in almost 

 identical language what had been said upon the subject 

 by his predecessors, without importing any originality or 

 opinions of his own. Many of these works, notwithstanding 

 this defect, are very interesting to the student of Spaniel 

 lore, and the perusal of Elaine's Rural Sports, Taplin's Sport- 

 ing Dictionary and Rural Repository, Scott's Sportsman's 

 Repository, and Needham's Complete Sportsman, can be 

 recommended to all who wish to study the history of the 

 development of the various modern breeds. The works 

 of the French writers, De Cominck, De Cherville, Blaze, and 

 Me'gnin, are well worth reading, while of late years the subject 

 has been treated very fully by such British writers as the late 

 J. H. Walsh (" Stonehenge "), Mr. Vero Shaw, Mr. Rawdon 

 Lee, Colonel Claude Cane, and Mr. C. A. Phillips. 



Nearly all of the early writers, both French and English, 

 are agreed that the breed came originally from Spain, and we 

 may assume that such early authorities as Gaston Phoebus, 

 Edward Plantagenet, and Dr. Caius had good reasons for 



