254 MANUAL FOE YOUNG SPORTSMEN. 



make a semicircle, so as to get the bird down wind of him, 

 and for this cause, and for others, of which anon, in no 

 kind of shooting is an extremely steady dog more neces- 

 sary than in this. 



Many writers, for this reason, recommend as the best 

 dog, for this sport, a very slow, old pointer — as if slow 

 dogs must needs always be steady, or fast dogs unsteady. 

 Neither of the two is the truth. 



For young sportsmen, for general shooting, I do, most 

 assuredly, recommend the pointer in preference to the set- 

 ter, and most of all for snipe-shooting, though for myself I 

 choose, and to all old and thorough workmen I advise, the 

 setter. 



Young sportsmen cannot be expected to break their 

 dogs, and all shooting over setters is in some sort dog- 

 breaking ; nor even to keep their well-broken dogs, by 

 their own conduct, well broken. A good pointer keeps 

 himself broken. 



I am well pleased to find that my preference for, or 

 prejudice in favor of — I care not which it is called — the 

 setter, is fully shared by that great authority Colonel 

 Hutchinson, whose work on dog-breaking is incomparably 

 the best in existence ; and for precisely the same reasons, 

 which I have often previously given, although, until I 

 have had this volume in preparation, I have never had 

 the opportunity of consulting him. He likewise draws the 

 same distinction with myself between steadiness and slow- 

 ness. 



If birds be in abundance, it matters not a straw how 

 slow a dog may be, nor much whether one have a dog at all. 



