We next come to the Setter. His head, like the Pointer should be broad at the top between the eyes; the muzzle though, must be longer and more tapering, and not over thick. Towards the eyes he must have a deepish indenture, and on the top of his skull a highish bony ridge. His ears should be long, pendulous, and slightly rounded. The eyes rather dark and full. His nose soft, moist, and large. Some breeds and breeders affect black noses and palates; but I must say that there are full as many good without the black as with it. I rather incline to the opinion that they are the best notwithstanding. Body like the Pointer, only deeper and broader, if anything; legs long to knee, short thence downwards; feet small, close, and thickly clothed with hair between the toes, ball and toe tufts they are termed; tail long, fine, and tapering, thickly feathered with long, soft, wavy hair; stern and legs down to feet also feathered. His body and feet also should be clothed with long, soft, silky hair, wavy, but no curl in it. This last smells badly of water spaniel. Colors, black and white, red and white, black and tan. These last I consider the finest bred ones. Roan also is good. The Irish setter is red, red and white, white and yellow spotted. The nose, lips, and palate always black. He is also rather more bony and muscular than the English breed, and ten times as headstrong and enduring. He requires constant and severe work, under most rigid discipline, to keep in anything like decent subjection.
The Russian Setter is as distinct from either of the above varieties as bulldog from greyhound. It is covered more profusely with long, thick, curly, soft, and silky hair, well on to the top of the head and over the eyes. He is also more bony and muscular, with a much shorter and broader head. What he wants in dash and ranging propensities, he makes up for in unwearied assiduity, extreme carefulness, and extraordinary scenting powers. The cross between this and either of the other setters is much valued by some breeders.
Of Spaniels there are several varieties, but of these the Suffolk Cocker is the only one deserving a notice. All the others are too noisy, too heedless, and too quick on their legs. It is almost impossible to keep any one of them steady, and, therefore, in this country at least, they are totally useless, since you would not see them from the beginning to the end of the day. Yaff! yaff! half a mile off, all the time putting up the birds, and you unable to stop them. The Suffolk Cocker, on the contrary, is extremely docile, can be easily broken, and kept in order. They are extremely valuable, thirty-five guineas being a low price for a brace of pure bred and well broken ones in England. The right sort are scarce, even there. Here, with two exceptions, I fancy they are not.
In appearance they are much like a raseed setter. The head and muzzle is much the same length and size; ears rather more rounded, but not so long; body deep, broad, and long; hair long and stiffish; legs and feet remarkably short, amounting almost to a deformity, and extraordinarily strong; tail short and bushy; it is usually curtailed a couple of joints. The purest colors are liver and white, fawn and white, and yellow and white. These dogs are slow and sure, remarkably close hunters, and obedient; just the things for cock shooting here. Too much cannot be said in their favor. They are easily taught to retrieve.
A Retriever is a cross breed dog. There is no true type of them. Every person has a peculiar fancy regarding them. The great object is to have them tolerably small, compatible with endurance. The best I have seen were of a cross between the Labrador and water spaniel, or the pure Labrador dog.
In some parts of the States Beagles are used, and it may be as well to point out the characteristics of them. First, then, a beagle ought not to exceed fourteen inches in height; its head ought to be long and fine; its ears long, fine also, beautifully round, thin, and pendulous, rather far set back; body not too long; chest broad and deep; loins broad at top, but narrow downwards; legs strong, but short; feet small and close; hair short and close; tails curved upwards and tapering, but not too fine. There is also another sort of beagles, wire-haired, flew-jawed, heavy hung, deep-mouthed. They are very true hunters, seldom leaving the trail till dead, or run to ground.
It is needless to say that at certain indefinite periods of the year a bitch comes into use, as the term is – generally twice a year, and still more generally speaking, during the time you most require her services, that is, April and September, spring snipe and grouse shooting, in consequence of which you must either sacrifice your pups or your sport. Now I am aware that in the States, for this reason, a bitch is seldom kept. For my part, I do not object to them, for from experience I can so regulate their failings as to prevent their family cares from interfering with their hunting. The knowledge of this enables me to have my pups when I want them, to get the cover of a dog I fancy, when a strange one comes my way also. The best time, then, to put the bitch to the dog is early in January. By this means you have your pups ready to wean by the middle of April. They have all summer to grow in, get strong, and large, and are fit to break in October on snipe first, and then quail, finishing off on snipe the following spring. After this litter, the bitch probably comes into use again in the end of July or in August. Young ones are not so fond of it as old ones, and, consequently, for quail shooting, your bitch is all correct and well behaved, so far as regards the dam. I look upon the breeding of dogs from any except the best and most perfectly formed of their species, as an act of great folly. There are times when it must be done to keep up the breed, or to acquire one; for no one drafts his best bitches unless he is an ass. For my part, I keep five or six constantly, and draft yearly all my dog pups but two or three, say one pointer, setter, and cocker. By this means I have the pick out of a large number of well bred ones for myself, while the drafts pay the expenses of keep and breaking. This is impossible for every one to do, and they must pick up their dogs the best way they can. It is my intention for the future to draft my setters to New York and my pointers westward. My cockers, I fear, will not go off yet, my imported dog having taken it into his head to die, and, until he is replaced from England – I have no stock for breed. I could only get a chance of four while last there out of many valuable kennels. However, I have promises of drafts from two or three parties, and ere summer cock come in, doubtless a brace or so will dare the perils of the sea for me; I have no hesitation in saying that, unless most amply remunerated, I would as soon sell my nose as the best pup in the litter, if I wanted it, nor would I advise any one else to do it. If done, you have to put up with inferior dogs. No; I breed to put a brace or so of the best young dogs yearly into my kennel, for my own use, and, while doing this, I also have, probably, ten good, well formed dogs to pick from, any one of which were one in want, would gladden the heart to get hold of. Sir William Stanley used to breed some fifty pointers yearly. Out of this lot, two brace were culled for his use. The rest were sold. They paid expenses. Many were excellent dogs, but he got the tip-top ones, and so he ought. This is the way a man who cannot afford to give great prices for good dogs must do, if he is much addicted to shooting. It requires two brace of dogs to do a day's shooting as it ought to be done. Each dog at full gallop the whole time, except, of course, when on birds; and to do this he must be shut off work about noon. Few dogs can go from morn till night without extreme fatigue. I never yet saw the dog that I could not hunt off his legs in a fortnight's hunt, taking him out every second day only, and feeding him on the best and strongest food. However, for general purposes, three brace of dogs are sufficient, and, when not often used, two are plenty; but no one ought ever to have less than two brace. It may be managed by always going out with a friend, he keeping one brace, you the other; he shooting to your dogs, you to his. For my part, give me three brace of my own, and let those be the best shaped, strongest, best bred, and best workers there can be. That is my weakness, and to achieve this I yearly sink a sufficient number of dollars to keep a poor man. But all this is digressing most fearfully from the nursery of young pointers and setters.
By receipt on a subsequent page, you will see how your bitch is to be brought into use. We will suppose her well formed and well bred. If faultless, put her to a dog nearly equal, if you cannot get one equal. Save the dog pups which will take after the dam. It is well understood that by breeding from young bitches you have faster and higher rangers; and this also reminds me to say that no bitch ought to be bred from till she is full grown, that is to say, till she is two years old. Many people breed at twelve months, but it is wrong. The bitch is not full grown, and, consequently, the puppies are poor, weak, and miserable. If the bitch has faults, find a dog of the same appearance as her, while he excels in those points she is deficient in. The bitches are partakers of his qualities. Are you short of bone, nose, size, form, temper, look for the excess of these. The cross, or, at all events, the next remove from it, will be just as you wish. Any peculiarity may be made inherent in a breed by sedulously cultivating that peculiarity. Avoid above all things breeding in and in brother and sister, mother and son, father and daughter – all bad, but the first far worse than either of the others, since the blood of each is the same. The other two are only half so. To perfect form should be added high ranging qualities, high courage, great docility, keen nose, and great endurance. That is the acme of breeding. A few judicious crosses will enable you to acquire it for your kennel. To the inattention and carelessness of sportsmen to these points are to be attributed the innumerable curs we nowadays see in comparison to well bred dogs. Anything that will find a bird will do. Far otherwise, to my mind. "Nothing is worth doing at all if it is not to be well done," and I would as soon pot a bevy of quail on the ground, as think of following an ill bred, ill broken, obstinate cur. It may perhaps be as well to state, that when I spoke of "crosses," I had not the slightest intention of recommending a cross of pointer and setter or bull dog. Far otherwise. Let each breed be distinct, but cultivate a "cross," be they pointer or spaniel, from another kennel of another breed of the same class of dogs.
With regard to setters, a little separate talk is necessary, for we have three sorts, English, Irish, and Russian. The cross of English and Irish may and does often benefit both races. So also does the Russian, but I would be extremely careful how I put him to one or the other. Extreme cases may and do justify the admixture, but the old blood ought to be got back as soon as possible. He is of quite a different species to the other, though with the same types or characteristics, yet this cross is rather approaching to mongrel. Having descanted somewhat largely on the preliminary portion, we will pass on to the rearing of the progeny.
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