here offered too rough going for the cocker it would have seemed 
more befitting his illustrious past to have bred him up to the field 
conditions rather than to have bred him away from all sporting 
usefulness. I sav "if," because I know from personal experience 
that in heavy timber a cocker proved to be markedly superior to 
his larger cousin, and Mr. A. Clinton Wilmerding has for vears 
He has a knack cf readily picking up tricks — and he never forgets them. A long 
memory is one of his fine mental traits 
every breed, of course, has its strong points and its weaknesses. 
In the first place, the cocker is a true spaniel with a spaniel’s 
disposition, which is the same thing as saying that he is affec¬ 
tionate and faithful. The love of the spaniel is proverbial. It 
is a more demonstrative love than that of the more independent 
terrier. “Wildbrat was faithful” is the motto of one of Europe’s 
proudest orders of knighthood, and Wildbrat was the favorite 
spaniel of the medieval prince who founded the order, who ex¬ 
tolled at once the loyalty of his four-footed companion and held 
it up as an example for his subjects. Nor has the present-day 
cocker changed in this. Faithfulness is one of his salient char¬ 
acteristics. 
The merry little cocker, besides being affectionate and true, is 
a bright, wide-awake little dog, but he possesses none of that 
rough-and-tumble boisterousness we associate with some dogs. 
Moreover, his intelligence is fairly uncanny. The docility of all 
spaniels has often been noticed, and this, together with their 
even disposition and cleverness, fits them peculiarly for the com¬ 
plex lives the dogs of our households live. A cocker will never 
embroil you in a neighborhood feud over a big, tortoise-shell 
cat, universally suspected, except by his fair mistress, of being 
the cause of sundry sleepless nights. He will never carry off 
the overshoes of an honored visitor, hiding them so securely 
that you must lend your own pair to insure your guest’s dry¬ 
footed return home. He will not make a practice of starting- 
pell-mell at one end of the hall, ending with a lifelike imitation 
of tobogganing, a Turkish rug serving as a sled over the parlor's 
glossy, hardwood floor. One would hardly look for such rowdy¬ 
isms from a dog that for centuries has been the intimate of kings 
and princes and the comrade of great lords and high nobles, and 
the cocker has inherited rather more than his share of the 
attractive character and disposition of his family. He is cpiite 
as affectionate as the toy spaniel without being so much of a 
sycophant. He is just as faithful and gentle and loyal. He is 
more intelligent, more capable and more plucky. 
In the matter of size, he has, of course, advantages all his own. 
True, he is a “big lap-full," but he is a sound, robust little chap, 
unafraid of colds and chills. He is big enough to be able to take 
care of himself outdoors: small enough to be easily handled in 
the house. 
The typical cocker is a sturdy, active, cobby, little dog — eighteen 
to twenty-four pounds weight sets the standard, but most present- 
day prize winners are closer to the lower than the upper limit. 
His back should be short, his chest deep, his quarters strong and 
muscular. His back must be straight, but his loin is slightly 
arched. His tail must be carried level with his back, never, even 
when he is excited, 
raised above the line 
of his back, and its 
wag, a merry wag 
from side to side, is 
very typical. His legs 
are short and heavily 
boned in front, while 
his hocks should be 
well bent and well let 
down. 
His head is expres¬ 
sive of great intelli¬ 
gence. The skull is 
quite wide, slightly 
rounded, and there is 
a sharp stop between 
the eyes, with a me¬ 
dian line, a slight 
( Cont. on page 340) 
maintained his cockers as true sporting dogs, hunting them each 
season. In the Eastern States there is plenty of good shooting 
country—and this type of country must increase in area—over 
which a cocker can hunt to advantage. 
So much for the sporting cocker. No one will begrudge him 
his sporting past, and some of us cannot help sighing just a little 
for his “good old days," when he was the boon companion of 
good sportsmen and true who loved him for himself and admired 
his wonderful nose, his pluck and his bird sense. 
If the American cocker spaniel has forsaken the field, he has 
won another niche for himself—his own peculiar niche from 
which no dog can oust him. Dog owners are inclined to be 
violent in their likes and dislikes. Each one will swear 
that, while all dogs are theoretically good, his own fa¬ 
vorite is unquestionably the best. It is indeed a peculiar 
tribute to the cocker spaniel that he shares with the Scot¬ 
tish terrier the unique honor of being very generally 
selected as a house dog by fanciers who keep their own 
pet breed in their kennels. Moreover, I have time and 
again heard men and women with wide experience in va¬ 
rious breeds of dogs maintain that the cocker is the beau 
ideal house dog, especially in a household where there are 
children. 
Last winter I was quail shooting in North Carolina 
with a sworn devotee of the English setter. Just how we 
got round to cockers I do not remember, but my friend 
stigmatized them with the epithet "glorified toys.” He 
intended to be as sarcastic as possible, and yet I think he 
really paid tribute to those very qualities that have en¬ 
deared the cocker to thousands. In a measure, he is 
truly a "glorified toy," possessing many of their obvious 
advantages without some of their disadvantages, for 
Although he looks very serious as a pup, the cocker is light 
and buoyant of spirit 
356 
