166 MANUAL FOR YOUNG SPORTSMEN. 
year—I must agree with that agreeable sporting English 
writer, “Craven,” that “the first place among shooting 
dogs must be awarded to the setter. 
“Tn style and dash of ranging, in courage and capa- 
city of covering ground; in beauty of form and grace of 
attitude; in variety of color and elegance of clothing; 
no animal of his species will at all bear comparison with 
him.” 
I will add that, in endurance of extreme fatigue; in 
supporting cold and wet; in facing thorny brakes and 
tangled covert; in travelling with uninjured feet over 
stony mountain ledges, across plains bristling with spiked 
sword-grass, or over burnt coppices ragged with jags and 
stubbs; and generally in working, day in and day out, for 
weeks, or through a season together, the setter distances 
the bravest pointers I have ever seen. 
His temper too is usually milder, he is a more affec- 
tionate and friendly dog—this praise is not, however, due 
to the Irish variety, which is apt t» be savage—and is, in 
my opinion, also a wiser and more intelligent and saga- 
cious animal; although he is so much more frolicsome, 
larking and high-spirited, that it is, undeniably, more diffi- 
cult to keep him in command, and more necessary to rule 
him with a strict hand and observant eye, than the pointer. 
For the made and complete sportsman, therefore, I 
without a moment’s doubt advise the adoption of the set- 
ter, especially for America, where, or at least in the greater 
part of which, almost all the shooting is either covert- 
shooting or marsh-shooting; for both of which branches 
of sport I consider one setter as equal, for the quantity 
