XXX PREFACE. 



and some of them very sufficiently stocked 

 with objects of pursuit, are by no means 

 equally favourable to our purpose. Three- 

 fourths of the ground of this nature pre- 

 sents only a close-shaven barley-stubble 

 or oatersh, that will barely perhaps afford 

 cover for an ant ; over which, although in 

 justice to a young dog it be necessary to 

 keep up his regularity of beat, we are 

 wasting our own time and his powers, 

 without a chance of interesting his atten- 

 tion ; whilst every now and then, a narrow 

 stripe of turnips, or some equivalent, holds 

 out a temptation of threading it from one 

 end to the other; thereby interrupting,, 

 and by frequent repetition doing away, all 

 attention to the first great lesson of a 

 regular quartering to windward; which 

 from the incalculable advantages con- 

 nected with it, it so much behoves the 

 tutor to enforce and to establish. In fact, 

 it is only where some such scope of coun- 

 try, as that which lies open to the more 

 exalted pursuits of the sportsman, amongst 

 the mountains of the north, that this great 

 lesson can be practised to every advan- 



