THE SETTER. 185 
fail to do this, and it is unusual for them to point except 
at hedgerows, or on running game. 
In America, wherever I have. shot, Hast or West, in 
Canada or in the States, I have but twice in. five and 
twenty years seen a setter set, and then it was accidental ; 
so far as this, that the dog usually stood. It is worthy of 
remark also, that, on my first arrival in this country, I 
shot over a dog which was bred in my own family and 
which I broke myself in England. I do not think I ever 
saw him point in his old country; I know I never saw him 
set in his new. After I lost him, I for many years im- 
ported dogs of the same family, which traced back to 
Lord Clare’s red Irish breed and Colonel Thornton’s cele- 
brated black dog “ Death,” and always with the same re- 
sult—not one of them ever set. 
T should like vastly to arrive at something, concerning 
this strange point in natural history, but it defies conjec- 
ture. 
I omitted above to say that in my own opinion, for 
choice, perhaps I should rather say for fancy, the best 
colors for English setters are pure black; pure white— 
the latter very rare—red and white, or lemon and white, 
with black noses; black and white, or black and tan. 
Roan, or fleabitten dogs, whether red and white speckle, 
called strawberry, or black and white speckle, called blue, 
are unobjectionable. 
But I have something of a prejudice against liver or 
liver and white setters ; as I regard the colors as belong- 
ing, of right, to the water-spaniel, or to the pointer, and 
therefore indicating the suspicion of a cross. In the 
