Jan. 9, 1909.] 
FOREST AND STREAM. 
59 
fuel or other equally safe source of powe'r on 
locomotive engines running through the forests; 
(2d) that the railroad companies be made to pay 
the whole cost of patrolling their tracks under 
State supervision, instead of one-half, as at 
present; (3d) that adequate means be provided 
to the Forest, Fish and Game Commission for 
the establishment of a more complete and sys¬ 
tematic fire patrol service; (4th) that a law be 
enacted for the licensing of guides, the register¬ 
ing of tourists, and the making of such records 
as will aid in determining the cause of forest 
fires and punishing their authors; (5th) that 
more stringent laws be enacted for the punish¬ 
ment of persons through whose carelessness or 
negligence forest fires are started, and (6th) 
that the Governor be empowered to suspend 
the hunting and fishing season in case of 
emergency.” E. K. P. 
The Reporter Dog. 
Nearly all dogs will show their capacity for 
intelligent initiative, if kindly and considerately 
treated, while being allowed a sufficient degree 
of freedom to permit it. As a matter of course, 
some will excel their fellows in this as in all 
other lines of effort. Some, indeed, may be so 
stupid as to be worthless. This trait may be 
observed among horses also. 
As a dog gains in experience, he becomes more 
adept in his selection of means to ends. All 
sportsmen of a reasonably broad experience have 
shot over dogs which, when reading, would first 
stop a long distance from the birds, to await the 
near approach of the shooter. At the proper 
juncture, the dog moved on either slowly and 
stealthily, halting and looking back betimes to 
note the whereabouts of the shooter to await 
his coming and to assist him in getting placed 
to advantage. He intelligently timed his move¬ 
ments to those of the shooter. Also, all sports¬ 
men of experience have known such team work; 
that is, a pause to await the coming of the 
shooter, as being interpreted as a true point. 
When the dog attempted to go on, he was or¬ 
dered to whoa, to toho, to charge, while the 
excited shooter went ahead vainly endeavoring 
to flush an imaginary bevy. The result—the dog 
was berated for false pointing. Had he been 
understood properly, and left to his own devices, 
he would have located the birds and thereby 
have scored a skillful success. A dog may be 
^tupid at times, but he has no monopoly of it. 
If the birds were running down wind, the dog, 
if proficient, would discover it, whereupon he 
would take a circuitous run around them, stop 
on a point down wind of them, thus holding 
them between himself and the shooter to await 
the latter’s action. In this manner, a success¬ 
ful shot is assured. This is team work, but not 
a bit superior to the common work displayed 
by the dog when a member of a pack. In most 
instances, an inexperienced shooter would con¬ 
sider this bad work—this abandonment of the 
trail—particularly if the dog were so unfortu¬ 
nate as to flush the birds in his intelligent at¬ 
tempt to play to the gun to secure results. In¬ 
stead of being credited with intelligent initiative 
and good intentions, he might be credited with 
malicious mischief and be rewarded with a sound 
beating. 
Few independent acts of intelligence are com¬ 
prehended by the average shooter. Indeed, any 
departure from fixed, arbitrary routine is firmly 
checked as a rule, till by constant repression all 
attempts at initiative are eradicated. Not one 
dog in a hundred has any opportunities to exer¬ 
cise initiative. 
A high degree of resourcefulness in emergency 
is displayed by the collie, or sheep dog. He 
works concurrently with his master in an ad¬ 
mirably skillful manner. If schooled, however, 
by the average shooter, the collie would be a 
nonentity. 
While there is much that is excellent in the 
combined team work of men and dogs, there is 
none so finished and comprehensive as that dis¬ 
played by poacher and lurcher. This is the re¬ 
finement of united effort of man and dog. As 
showing in a general, fragmentary way the 
ability of the lurcher, the following is taken 
from the work of a famous English authority, 
Hugh Dalziel (Corsincon) : 
“It would be in vain to look for the lurcher 
in the streets or parks of London, or in any 
of our considerable towns, or at any time of our 
dog shows. In some of our manufacturing 
towns he is kept, but out of sight; his appear¬ 
ance is so suggestive that the modesty and re¬ 
tiring disposition • of his master will not allow 
him to parade the dog before the public gaze. 
The lurcher is, in fact, par excellence the 
poacher’s dog, and those who desire to see him 
must look for him in the rural districts; there 
look out for the jobbing laborer, the man who 
never works, but from dire necessity, a sturdily 
built, but rather slouching fellow, whose very 
gait and carriage—half swagger, half lurch—pro¬ 
claim the midnight prowler, and close to his 
heels, or crouched at his feet beneath the ale 
house bench, you will find the lurcher. 
“The dog is by no means the ugly brute he 
is sometimes described to be. True, they vary 
greatly, and the name more properly describes 
the peculiar duties of the dog, and his manner 
of performing them, than distinctiveness of type; 
but still the old-fashioned genuine lurcher has 
a well-defined character of his own which no 
other dog can lay claim to. 
“The lurcher proper is a cross between the 
Scotch collie and the greyhound—an average one 
will stand about three-fourths the height of the 
greyhound; more strongly built and heavier 
boned, yet lithe and supple withal, his whole 
conformation giving an impression of speed, just 
as his blinking, half-closed eye, as he lies pre¬ 
tending to sleep, impresses one with his intelli¬ 
gence and cunning. His coat is rough, hard and 
uneven; his ears are coarse, and altogether there 
is an air of, not rusticity, but vulgarity, about 
him. You cannot help associating dog and mas¬ 
ter, and, to be just, you will admit that there 
has been gross neglect or fundamental errors 
in the education and bringing up of both dog 
and man, for which they may not be altogether 
responsible; and, to conclude your philosophiz¬ 
ing, you may, with a sigh, regret that so much 
capacity for real work should be turned into a 
wrong channel. 
“If we may compare the two in morals, the 
dog has much the better of it. He worships his 
master; he is as ready to defend as to adulate; 
his obedience is willing, .prompt and thorough 
and rendered with a silence that would com¬ 
mand the praise of the Chelsea philosopher. No 
yelp, youf, or yowl from the lurcher. Steady 
at heel or keeping watch at the stile till the wire 
is in the meuse and the net across the gate; then 
a motion of the hand, and, without a whimper, 
he is round the field, driving rabbit and hare 
into the fatal snare. 
“I attribute the wonderful intelligence dis¬ 
played by some lurchers I have known to their 
constant and most intimate association with their 
owners. They eat, sleep and thieve together; 
and if the dog were not of Sir Wilfrid Lawson’s 
opinion on the subject, they would, after a suc¬ 
cessful raid on the squire’s preserves—like Tam 
o’ Shanter and Sbuter Johnny—‘be drunk for 
weeks together.’ 
“Lurchers will run either by nose or sight, 
as suits them, but always cunning. Let them 
start a hare, they .will probably make for the 
meuse and meet poor Wat; but their great game 
is with crouching stealthy step to pounce on him 
in his form. 
“All of them will retrieve their game. Watch 
that itinerant tinker and collector of sundries, 
trudging behind that thing on four wheels he 
calls a cart, drawn by a nag that should be at 
the knacker’s; he has seen the keeper heading 
for the Pig and Whistle, ‘Hie in, Jerry!’ and 
the lurcher that enters the spinney empty- 
mouthed comes out two hundred yards below 
and deposits a hare at his master’s feet. 
“As before said, these dogs vary greatly in 
general size and shape, and so they do in color, 
but my beau ideal of a lurcher is a heavyish 
greyhound conformation with enough of the 
collie to make them look intelligent, and in color, 
red, brindle or a grizzle.” 
The foregoing shows the intelligence and 
loyalty of the dog when treated as a companion, 
and permitted to exercise his own methods. 
[to be continued.] 
The Holidays in California. 
Los Angeles, Cal., Dec. 26. —Editor Forest 
and Stream: This year has been “Merry Christ¬ 
mas,” indeed, for the duck shooters. Sport gen¬ 
erally is good about the holidays, but is not 
always strung out so continuously through the 
entire month preceding as has been the case 
this season. 
I believe the early rains caused a general seed¬ 
ing by ranchers a month earlier than usual, and 
that the scattering of barley on the fields has 
had something to do with the duck plenty by 
giving them inducements to remain here. As 
a case in point, the sport in the old Ballona 
might be cited. Last year this formerly splen¬ 
did shooting ground was thought to have been 
shot out. It is only a dozen or so miles from 
town and civilization had encroached upon the 
marshes in several directions, but the shooting 
nevertheless has been the best in several years, 
and observing duck hunters can see no other 
reason for the abundance of fowl remaining 
there except the seeding theory. Sprigs, wid¬ 
geon and other birds that prefer a grain diet 
are most plentiful there just now. 
In the Bolsa, forty miles below Los Angeles, 
the hunters have been drilling out the limit with 
regularity. I took away one limit with a twenty- 
gauge Wednesday, and another with a different 
gun of the same bore to-day. The birds are 
mostly teal and spoonies, but in good condition, 
and so plentiful that no one could ask for bet¬ 
ter sport than has been the rule for a month 
past. Edwin L. Hedderly. 
