WORDS OF COMMAND 



With an increasing degree of amused in- 

 terest I have recently watched a number of 

 men — keen, practical, outdoor men, rush with 

 common impulse to a most uncommonly 

 false conclusion. The spirit with which 

 these dog men of all degrees welcome the 

 Utopian dream of a universal language has 

 but few parallels in history. Generally 

 speaking, there are five classes of men in- 

 terested. The professional handler and his 

 amateur brother, the owner, the field-trial 

 judge and the reporter. Having myself been 

 at various times in the position of handler, 

 judge, owner and reporter, it is not only the 

 amusing, but the pathetic side, which 

 strongly appeals to me at this writing. I 

 can well understand why each should, on 

 first impulse, grasp almost any opportunity 

 of escape from an old and deep-seated 

 trouble. 



The professional handler is a man who, 

 as a rule, works very hard for his money, 

 and who has to contend with difficulties, 

 very much out of proportion with his du- 

 ties. Bad weather, bad grounds, birds that 

 are wild and birds that can't be found. 

 Thick-headed dogs with soft-headed own- 

 ers, and dough-headed dogs with hard- 

 headed owners; judges who can't judge and 

 reporters who shouldn't be allowed to re- 

 port. With all these the professional might 

 be a very happy man, but fate has willed 

 otherwise. He must take an English dog, 

 teach him to obey Irish or Dutch commands, 

 and then turns him over to a Frenchman, a 

 New Yorkers or a "Down Easter," who, 

 with strange words, will ask the poor can- 

 ine to do impossible things. Truly, the 

 professional handler's lot is a hard one, and 

 there should be a heavy punishment for the 

 owner who asks his dog to "charge" when 

 the handler has taught him to "drop." 



The amateur handler also has mighty good 

 reasons for demanding a uniform set of com- 

 mands. After much careful thought and 

 perusal of all the standard works on "break- 

 ing," or training, he 'has taught his dog to 

 "come here," "fetch it," "drop," "steady," or, 

 perhaps, "to-ho." Now, there is a movement 

 set on foot to make certain commands il- 

 legal. Truly, there is need of prompt ac- 

 tion. He can't teach his dog all over again, 

 and he dares not fly in the face of the au- 

 thorities and defy them. Therefore, he will 

 endorse the plea for uniform commands, and 



when the authorities meet in solemn con- 

 vention he will present a petition that the 

 words which he has taught be adopted for 

 all time. It was hard for him to decide 

 what words of command to use in his work, 

 but, having mastered tihe problem, and taught 

 "Sport" the true inwardly meaning of "to- 

 ho" (quite an accomplishment, by the way), 

 the art must be protected and kept pure. 



The owner (as he is here classed, the man 

 who pays some one to break, or handle, for 

 him), like the professional handler, has 

 troubles of his own that the outsider knows 

 nothing of — sick dogs, and dead dogs, hand- 

 lers without conscience, amateur judges and 

 anonymous reporters. In public competi- 

 tion he learns to accept these with good 

 grace. But when he turns from the trials 

 to his private shooting, and finds that his 

 dog does not consider his words worthy of 

 notice, he prays for a language that will 

 convey his wishes, pure and unabridged, to 

 the seat of that dog's understanding. He 

 sometimes even desires words to express his 

 feelings toward the man who gave his pup 

 its education. 



The judge, in his turn, would welcome as 

 a blessing the establishment of uniformity 

 in commands. Under the present conditions 

 he feels that it is quite possible for him to 

 be deceived. Unless he understands perfectly 

 the meaning of the very numerous words 

 of command how is he to know whether or 

 not the dog is obedient. This is also true 

 of the reporter. If the number of commands 

 adopted is not too large, and is confined to 

 words of one syllable, it will be an easy mat- 

 ter for him to learn them by heart. 



In order to make this new idea a rule 

 there must, of course, be a total elimination 

 of all unnecessary orders or expressions 

 used in handling the dog. This sounds quite 

 simple, but when one stops to consider that 

 to do this it will be necessary for some of 

 our best handlers to forget a number of ex- 

 pressions which they've used on generations 

 of field-trial winners, it looks like quite a 

 proposition. However, admit for the sake of 

 argument that this is quite feasible, and sup- 

 pose that the field commands are reduced to 

 a given number, what is the effect on the 

 dog. In my opinion, after all is said and 

 done, the dog will continue to obey the ges- 

 ture, the whistle and the tone of the com- 

 mand, almost, if not quite regardless, of the 

 word that is spoken. If the command is 



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