202 MANUAL FOR YOUNG SPORTSMEN. 
tematic a pursuit of the sport, with consequent expenditure 
of time and attention, as few or no American sportsmen 
are willing or able to bestow on what is, to most men, but 
an occasional and rare pastime. 
For the most part, then, we must rest content with our 
setters or pointers, and must satisfy ourselves with over- 
coming to the best of our abilities the difficulties which 
we must encounter. 
Nevertheless, I would strongly recommend it to such 
sportsmen as have the means, the leisure, and the oppor- 
tunity, to procure a brace of good and well broke cocking 
spaniels, at least for summer cock-shooting. It is not 
only the true method, but it is far more exhilarating and 
exciting, it is less fatiguing, and, as it gives the sportsman 
far more opportunity of choosing his own position for 
shooting in the paths, runways and glades, instead of being 
forced to blunder into thickets in order to drive up his 
game, it is by far the most killing mode. 
The spaniel naturally gives tongue on his scent the 
moment he strikes it, hunts it up with the rapidity of 
light, and springs his bird or starts his hare with a rush. 
By education he is made to hunt mute, or at most to 
express his delight at finding the hot scent streaming up to 
his nostrils by a suppressed whimper, to track the game 
foot by foot, pausing to note the vicinity and whereabout 
of the shooter, and to give tongue only when it is flushed. 
This steadiness and closeness of range and of dropping 
to charge the instant the shot is fired, and lying hard 
until ordered to “ hie on /” is all that is required of the 
spaniel; but that ad/ is not a little; for the spirit in the 
