Early Spaniels and Setters 101 
“My spaniels clam’ring loud, awake the morn 
With notes of joy and leaping high, salute 
With grateful tongue my hand, and frisk around 
In sportive circles; till the loaded gun 
Breaks off their idle play, and at my heels 
Submiss they follow, and await the word 
That bids them dash into the welcome woods.” 
“Though silently we beat 
At other seasons, let our joyful cheers, 
In concert with the op’ning dogs, resound 
“Hie in.’—At that glad word away they dart, 
And winding various ways, with careful speed 
Explore the cover. Hark! that quest proclaims 
The woodcock’s haunt. Again! now joining all, 
They shake the echoing wood with tuneful notes. 
T heard the sounding wing—but down the wood 
He took his flight. I meet him there anon. 
As fast I press to gain the wish’d for spot, 
On either side my busy spaniels try. . 
At once they wheel—at once they open loud, 
And the next instant, flush the expectant bird.” 
“arrested by the shot, 
With shattered wing reversed and plumage fair 
Wide scattering in the wind, headlong he falls. 
See how the joyful dogs exulting, press 
Around the prostrate victim, nor presume 
With lawless mouths to tear his tender skin. 
Obedient to my voice, one lightly brings 
The lifeless bird and lays it at my feet.” 
Our final quotation will be a short one from the description of duck- 
and snipe-shooting: mo 
“Curled on their warm and.strawy beds; repose - 
My dogs, save two, whose coats sable and white, 
And speckled legs, and tail well fringed and ears 
Of glossy silken black, declare their kind —«~ 
By land or water, equally prepared 
To work their busy way. My steps alone 
These follow in the depth of Winter’s reign.” 
RE er RR es 
The sable and white is not the misnamed sable of the present-day collies,: 
but black and white. . a aes 
That this poetical sportsman was correct -in ‘his thus setting aside- 
