OF BREEDING GENERALLY 
663 
cleaned by her tongue, it will be proper to select such as are 
to be kept, while those that are deemed superfluous should 
be immediately drowned. In the chase, a preference should 
be given to those having a resemblance to dogs of the pack 
of established worth, and possessing at the same time the 
strongest make, as the smaller puppies are likely to turn out 
weak. If a whole litter is wished to be preserved, and if it 
is larger than can be nursed with ease and safety by the 
dam, a few should be taken from her and given to a foster- 
mother. Sometimes, however, it is difficult to get another 
bitch to nurse strange puppies. A method, which has been 
successfully practised, is to rub the puppies so selected with 
a little of the foster-mother’s milk, when, in general, she will 
carefully lick them, and adopt them as her own. 
While nursing, the bitches should be well fed with flesh, 
broth, milk, porridge, &c., several times a day. When 
puppies are a few weeks old, milk should be offered them, 
and they will soon learn to lap it, which will greatly relieve 
the dams. By the end of six weeks they will be able to feed 
themselves, and may then be removed from the nursing- 
quarters. These observations apply to dogs generally. 
Many of the most experienced sportsmen, and also writers 
on this subject, conceived that hounds may be hunted while 
nursing; but this is an opinion with which no physiologist 
or medical man can concur; for violent exercise of any kind 
has a strong tendency to injure the quality of the milk, 
and must, consequently, have a bad effect on the young pro¬ 
geny. 
When the puppies of dogs of the chase are three or four 
days old the points of their tails should be twisted off. 
This operation is performed by placing the tail between the 
fore-finger and thumb; press the nail of the latter on the 
joint, and twist the tip of *he tail gently round, and a 
