FINISHING TOUCHES 
137 
others it must be taught. The force system is 
to be recommended except where natural re¬ 
trieving is unquestionably true and depend¬ 
able—as it is developed to such a high degree 
in some of the Spaniels. But the force system 
is usually by far the most satisfactory.) 
5. The foregoing are the fundamental 
essentials in the working dog. Backing— 
that is, honoring the point of another dog— 
and a number of little refinements that go to 
make the truly high-class field companion 
and helper depend upon the particular dog’s 
own natural ability cultivated by a master 
who understands him thoroughly. (In the 
April, 1923, issue of the “American Maga¬ 
zine” there is an article by Samuel A. Derieux, 
in which he tells of a dog he once owned that 
would go out very wide to find birds, then 
back away from them and find his master and 
lead him {Mr. Derieux) to the covey which 
Buck would again promptly point. Such de¬ 
velopment as this is, however, strikingly out¬ 
standing.) 
I have just finished reading a story en¬ 
titled “The Red Queen,” by T. von Zie- 
kursch, in the February 20, 1923, issue of the 
