102 The Dog Book 
certain dogs for certain sports receives a very strong endorsement by that 
eminent engraver, S. Howitt, whose illustrations of sports are recognised 
as masterpieces. Very unfortunately in our copy of the extremely rare 
volume of seventy-two of his engravings which form the “ British Sportsman” 
that of the setter is one of the two missing illustrations, but this is fully 
atoned for by those representing netting and the five sports treated of in the 
poem on fowling. 
As further showing that the term setter applied perhaps as much to the 
dog that set or pointed as to the breed, we give Sydenham Edwards’s group 
showing the setter as one of the family of spaniels. The colours of these 
four spaniels are: liver and white, the one to the left; black and white, the one 
lying down; lemon and white, the one sitting; but the far one is quite an 
indefinite colour, one that an Irish-setter enthusiast would claim as repre- 
senting that breed, and possibly it may. It is undoubtedly high on the leg 
and of setter formation and is self-coloured, neither liver nor lemon, so that 
we are perfectly satisfied to regard it as an Irish setter. We have several 
of Sydenham Edwards’s coloured engravings and all are exceedingly faithful 
in drawing, so that we can without hesitation accept anything he did as 
faithfully representing the animals indicated by the title of the engraving. 
The date of “The Spaniel” is January 1, 1801. 
Tue Turee Breeps or Setrers: Enciisu, Irish, AND GorDON 
Four years later Sydenham Edwards published another engraving 
entitled “The Setter,” in which he very distinctly shows the English, Irish, 
and Gordon setters as shown herewith. This engraving is coloured, as is 
the case of all we have seen by Edwards, so that, although it is not very 
clearly indicated in the reproduction, we can, on the original, see that the 
farther black dog has tan markings on the lips, the centre one is red, with 
white blaze, and the near one is white. This engraving we take to indicate 
clearly that these were recognised as the three varieties of the setter and 
that they were thoroughly established at that time, although very little 
evidence is forthcoming in books of the period. 
Through the courtesy of Mr. Cunningham, of Philadelphia, we have 
had the pleasure of seeing an exquisite painting by Desportes, court painter 
to Louis XIV. Vero Shaw in “The Book of the Dog” gives a copy of 
Desportes’s painting of “Dogs and Partridges,” showing three sparsely 
