312 TRAINING. 



reduce its extent no courser of experience will dispute. The 

 principle is clear enough which should regulate the amount of 

 work namely, to carry it out to such an extent as to reduce 

 superfluous flesh, and improve the wind and stamina, without at 

 the same time making the dog slow or slack, and carefully 

 avoiding the injurious effect which is so well known as 'over 

 marking.' To do this requires the practised eye of the trainer, 

 and indeed there are very few men who can be trusted fully to 

 alter the amount of work according to circumstances. I have 

 myself had dogs brought out to perfection by the same man who, 

 with another lot, differently bred, trained them to death's door. 

 With regard to the use of a horse in training, there can be no 

 doubt that it can be dispensed with if the trainer is an active man 

 and can walk from sixteen to twenty miles on end. But there are 

 few who both can and will do this, and hence I prefer the use of 

 the horse, which few trainers are industrious enough to eschew. 

 Slow roadwork I am satisfied does good in every way, hardening 

 the feet, strengthening the nails, and in this way preventing many 

 of the accidents likely to occur in the coursing field. Fast road- 

 work, that is, carried to the extent of galloping, will injure the speed ; 

 but a steady trot has no such effect, as is proved by the fact that 

 ( Barrator ' was trained by Mr. Briggs entirely in this way, and 

 that Mr. Dixon's flyers, ' Deacon ' and ' Dalton,' did most of their 

 work on the road. No doubt if a greyhound is confined to 

 his kennel, or to a small grass paddock, for months, during 

 which his feet become unaccustomed to friction, he will be made 

 footsore, and his muscles shaken, by at once putting him to 



