140 DOMESTICATED DOGS. 
crossing or careful breeding, the setter assumed the pointer’s 
standing position, and this has now become as common. with the 
one breed as with the other. 
There is a much greater variety among setters than among 
pointers, and not only has each division of the United Kingdom 
its peculiar breed of them, but there is also a Russian strain in 
this country, celebrated for nose and steadiness, but too woolly 
coated for our early autumn work. Asa rule, the setter is faster 
than the pointer, but not so steady, frequently requiring a day or 
two’s work before he can be relied on. Usually he will not work 
long without water, and many breeds are quite useless on land 
where water is out of reach. From his hairy feet he stands the 
friction of the heather on moorland shootings better than the 
pointer, and he also bears exposure to wet and cold with more 
impunity. Hence the setter was always considered the grouse- 
dog and the pointer ¢he partridge-dog ; but, as I have elsewhere 
remarked, the retriever has now superseded the latter in his proper 
vocation, and he must either work on the moors or not at all. 
I shall now proceed to describe the four varieties of the setter, 
beginning with— 
(a) THE ENGLISH SETTER. 
In my young days the use of the setter wag almost confined to 
the moors of Scotland, Wales, the North of England, and Ireland. 
Almost every grouse-shooter had his own particular breed or 
strain, but the five I have alluded to in process of time absorbed 
all the rest. Gradually the setter was spread over England, but 
in most cases preference was given to dogs resembling those 
which are now par excellence called English, that is to say, setters 
with no marked difference from the type of their kind, either in 
colour or shape. About sixty years ago the late Mr. Laverack of 
Manchester began to be noted for his breed, which was derived 
from a single pair, and he alleged that ever since that time he 
bred “in and in” to them without outcross of any kind. These 
two were named “Ponto” and “Old Moll,” bred by the Rev. 
A. Harrison, near Carlisle, and he had kept the breed pure for 
thirty-four years, so that, if Mr. Laverack’s account is true, the 
Laverack setter has been bred “in and in” for a hundred years. 
