THE SETTEE. 169 



a general thing, that the setter need not suffer, while the 

 great preponderance of snipe and marsh-shooting gives him 

 the preference. 



The only portion of the United States, in which I 

 should consider the pointer preferable, is the dry prairies 

 of the "West, where it is frequently indispensable to carry 

 out water for the dogs in grouse-shooting, which takes 

 place in the intolerably hot weather, on those treeless 

 plains, of August and the earlier part of September. 



A prodigious quantity of nonsense has been written 

 under the pretext of ascertaining or deriving the original 

 breed and stock of the setter — jome writers insisting that 

 he is a treble or quadruple mongrel, part setter, part 

 pointer, and some add, part Newfoundland and part fox- 

 hound. 



One sporting writer — wonders will never cease ! — and 

 he a man of some repute both as a sportsman and an 

 authority, has actually given a receipt in one of his works, 

 for manufacturing a setter. He desires the aspirant for 

 the possession of a perfect dog of this breed, of which he 

 records his own opinion, that it is the best in the world, to 

 cross a foxhound with a pointer, and to recross the pro- 

 geny with the low small Newfoundland of St. Johns. The 

 offspring of this last cross is to be the given setter. 



And this, as if there were not half a dozen pure and 

 distinct families of setters reproducing themselves to the 

 smallest distinctive mark of shape, coat and color, genera- 

 tion after generation, in England alone, without taking into 

 consideration the Russian and Irish varieties. 



He had precisely as well, in order to raise a London 

 8 



