8 PRINCIPLES OF DOG TRAINING. 
same. If he has it under subjection he is better 
qualified to succeed than if he were without it. I 
have always observed that men possessed of high 
temper, able to restrain it, have more will and 
resolution, and are less likely to abandon any 
project or enterprise which they undertake. Tem- 
per, when under control, becomes a nobler attri- 
bute, spirit; but when unrestrained it degenerates 
into a beastly passion, deprives man of reason, 
strips him of dignity, and places him on a level 
with the brute whose standard he will in vain 
attempt to elevate. 
I would not advise you, as some authorities 
have done, to procure a spike collar and attempt 
to teach your pupil everything at once. These 
men, denouncing the whip as an instrument of 
torture, would substitute another doubly severe 
in its application, and no more calculated-to disa- 
buse the mind of the tortured pupil of the instru- 
mentality of his master in the punishment. 
Though the education of sporting dogs should 
begin in early puppyhood, my experience warrants 
me in fixing the limit at the fourth month. Les- 
sons begun much earlier than this, I am inclined 
to think, beget timidity, unless great caution on 
