2 @¢ThEchO TIT E oe - THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG WARREN H. MILLER "7 bd } { ‘ ; . + ; 3 i ag i ‘ by - i Jeon ere hte ‘ 5 ; +7 Ff THE TENSE MOMENT—QUAIL SCENT! THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG MODERN STRAINS OF BIRD DOGS AND HOUNDS, AND THEIR FIELD TRAINING BY WARREN H. MILLER Former Editor of Field and Stream Avursor or “Campine Out,” “Rirtes anp SHOTGUNS,” H “Tue Boy’s Book or Huntine snp FisHina,” | Etc. ILLUSTRATED NEW YORK GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY COPYRIGHT, 1919, BY GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY COPYRIGHT, 1916, 1917, 1918, BY FIELD & STREAM PUBLISHING CO. PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA PREFACE Tus little volume is written to furnish an up- to-date book confined exclusively to the breeds of American hunting dogs in use to-day. Without a dog, sports afield nowadays are apt to prove rather barren in results in the game bag. Never before have American sportsmen relied so much on the dog as a finder of game. Our coverts, while holding their own and somewhat increasing, are far depleted compared to the abundance that ob- tained thirty years ago. It takes the fine, sensi- tive gift of a dog’s instinct to locate game nowa- days. Without him the day is likely to be one of exasperation, due to game flushing without warn- ing or good covers hunted without starting any- thing.. With him a satisfactory day’s bag can be had in any part of our country where there is wild land, even quite near the great cities. The love of a dog is a fine and noble thing. There is no quid pro quo in his affection. He has no thought of service for hire, nor reward for his invaluable aid, save that you love him as he loves you. All the rest is service, given freely and loy- Vv vl PREFACE ally. To combine this dog-love with the wonder- fully gifted genius of a fine hunting dog seems the acme of canine destiny. If you are to own a dog, or several of them, why not have one that can share and appreciate your days in the great out- doors? How to choose such a hunting companion intel- ligently and from the selection of dogs that are living to-day; how to raise him from puppyhood to maturity; how to train him for staunch and efficient field service—to tell of these is the pur- pose of this volume. Warren H. Miter. Interlaken, N. J. CONTENTS CHAPTER PAGE I HisrorrcaL Notes on. THE Huntinec Doe . = 13 II Wuo’s WHoin Brrp Docs ........ 38 III Wuo’s Woo 1n Hounp Dogs ....... 55 PN PUICTAS: Prt, DOGS ois se sae es 68 AACE ETI ea V 5a coh a a Sr 6!) cen ad in HR a 85 Stel UUEDING A ok. aie 6 we e's oe 105 Wil) Kune CONSTRUCTION . . 2. 6 6 se 114 Se OG, TATNING $9250 2 5s ew eta wt es 129 IX Doacy QuEsSTIONS AND ANSWERS ..... 166 MG WISMASRS fo 15 Veh ie vais) ae Bid tees 198 ILLUSTRATIONS Tue Tense Moment—Qvait Scent. . . Frontispiece PAGE CuHaptTer II: a aes ein Viana Me ps Poy Re ee A ek eva) LLEWELLIN Surat Two SouTHERN POINTERS ON QUAIL CHARTS: Tue LLEWELLIN HieRarcHy AT A GLANCE A Wetu-BLoopep IrisH SETTER PEDIGREE A Typtcat ALFoRD’s JOHN Harp-CasuH PoINnNTER PEDIGREE A PEDIGREE SHOWING THE C@sSAR-RANCOCAS JACK BRANCH OF THE LLEWELLINS ia Ne ‘ 64 TypicaAL RABBIT Hate Ae FOR A mes Ss Hunt Four Crack LLEWELLINS—OpEssa (pointing), LANARK Lap, Gypsy NoBLE, AND TONOPAUGH Momoney II—A Crack FIELD TRIAL SETTER Tue LLEWELLIN SETTER “ Boaz”’ TypicaAL TENNESSEE REDBONE Coon Hounp Dimz, PENNSYLVANIA Coon HounpD Lapy BreLtte B—Rassit BEAGLE AIREDALE TERRIER, CH. ILLUMINATOR Tur CHAMPION PornTERs “ MANITOBA RAP”? AND ‘‘ ALFORD’S JOHN”’ CadrTen IVs 3.62. . 80 THE CULBERTSON / OO ier ces ee Pack ix x ILLUSTRATIONS PAGE IrntsH SETTERS, USED FOR PRAIRIE CHICKEN Two AIREDALES WITH A BEAR AND A LION TO THEIR CREDIT Mr. Doo.try, ONE oF THE Best Brep [IRISH WATER SPANIELS IN THE UNITED STATES Tony T. AND BessiE—NoTED CHESAPEAKES GrREYLOCK—A FINE AMERICAN-BRED GRIFFON Caaprmm Ve 0. eu \,, SLA A Nice LittTsr oF SETTER Puppies, Two Montus OLD ENGLISH SETTER Pups ABpout Four Montus Op THREE PoInTER Pups ON Point at Two Montus RETRIEVER AT Srtx WereEexs AGE—Pup By SIR ROGER DE COVERLEY AND BLUE GIRL JANE Crs pate ub yi 3. aktew ses ee 108 A GRADUATE IN RETRIEVING—13-MonTus SETTER Pup LooKkinG FoR MotTHER A SMALL FamMILty OF CHESAPEAKES, Husky AND WELL-NOURISHED Too Many Pups ror HER To FEED PROPERLY Caarter VII; 0. ols a Broop Matron KENNEL KENNEL FOR Two 60-L8. Huntine Docs THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG | Ba i} THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG CHAPTER I HISTORICAL NOTES ON THE HUNTING DOG THe dog dates back to geological times. In the Pleistocene we have a great dog, twelve feet long, distinct from the wolf of that period, whose skele- ton has come down to us nearly intact. While dogs, wolves and foxes are closely allied, the in- terbreeding of wolves and dogs alone is well au- thenticated. There is no well established account of any crossing of foxes and dogs, though I have seen several small dogs in the South that looked so exactly like foxes that one could almost believe the negro’s story that a true cross had been made. It seems more improbable than a cross of wolf and dog, for the bonal structure around the eye of the fox differs materially from that of the wolf and dog, and it is a question whether the pro- toplasmic cells would unite. The principal specific difference between the fox species and the wolves and dogs is in the pupil 13 14 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG of the eye, that of the fox being cat-like, in shape similar to the cross-section of a lens, and that of both wolves and dogs being round; and the fox eye, in turn, owes its shape to the bonal structure of the eye, which is the principal skeletal differ- ence between the skull of a fox and that of dogs and wolves. From the earliest records of man, however, the dog appears as a domesticated animal. The cave men of all periods have left both the bones of dogs, and bones gnawed by them and since fos- silised, and they were undoubtedly used as hunt- ing companions and watch dogs by our very earli- est forebears. The earliest known relic of man, except the man- ape (pithecanthropoid) is the skull found at Tal- gai, in Australia, antedating even the famous Pitts- down skull which put the ancestry of man back in the Pleistocene. The Australian skull is in- teresting for two reasons; it was found in deposits of a time when all the animals of Australia were marsupials, and it is surrounded with the bones of dingo dogs and marsupial bones gnawed by those dogs, besides others broken by the man. Now, as these two were the only non-marsupials in all the deposits of that period, it follows that the man must have come to Australia and brought HISTORICAL NOTES 15 his dingo dogs with him, showing a high degree of intelligence in the man and the fact that even then he had domesticated the wild dog to be his hunting companion. The vast antiquity of this skull, coupled with the fact that for no less than three times the apes have perished off the earth and been re-developed, argues that man himself is older than the apes of to-day which Darwin thought were our progenitors. Present-day geolo- gists (even Darwin himself would so argue, if he were possessed of our latter-day discoveries); argue that, if anything, the ape is a degenerate man or an evolution from the dog, while man is sui generis, traceable as yet to no lower animal. This has long been my own theory—I have always rejected the whole of Darwin’s descent of man as illogical when we consider what we know of man from his earliest records—whereas the degenera- tion of man is very patent, even to-day, when we can see on the earth many types that are far in- ferior in intelligence, devotion and conscientious- ness to a good setter dog, with his highly trained reason, his sense of honour, obedience, courage, his fidelity to his duty in his sphere in life, all of such an order as to proclaim him possessed of a soul, certainly more so than are the lowest types of humans. 16 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG Coming down into historical times, the earliest Egyptian and Biblical records contain mention of the dog, and in Egypt they had already been bred into at least two types, the guard dogs for flocks of sheep, and the hunting and coursing dogs used in the chase, both of which types are pic- tured in stone hieroglyphics and mummy-case decorations. Both the drop-eared and prick-eared types are represented. The latter came directly from the wolf and jackal; as to the former, no skeleton can show, but the cave men had them if a broad skull like a modern setter or hound bespeaks a lop ear. My own theory is that for the guard- dog type the ear was gradually extended, due to the demands of the business for good hearing, un- til it fell over of its own weight, thus forming the drop-eared type. As to nose, both kinds had equally good, as witness the wolf to-day, a prick- eared type which is as good a tracker as runs. By Roman times three distinct types had been developed, called by them the sagaces (trackers), celeres (coursers) and pugnaces (fighters). Drawings and pen pictures by Roman writers would place these types as represented to-day by the coonhounds and bird dogs for the sagaces, greyhounds, wolfhounds and collies, for the ce- leres, and bulldogs, terriers, etc., for the pugnaces. HISTORICAL NOTES 17 The generic name ‘‘hound’’ comes from the same root as ‘‘hunt’’ and signifies a dog used in hunting. The Assyrians, Greeks, Persians, Egyptians, Ro- mans and Teutons all had dogs for both hunting and war, and the pugnaces were as much war dogs then as any other destructive agency that could be used in augmenting military force. The day of the Roman shaded gradually into -medizval times when the dog developed into still other types, particularly with the introduction of missile weapons. House dogs were bred small so as to be suitable for milady’s boudoir, one of the most ancient lap-dog breeds being the spaniel, whose name tells us he was developed in Spain, probably in the tenth century and possibly of yet earlier lineage from the Saracens, for we find the same breed in the Chinese court spaniel, dating back for untold centuries in the Chinese records, showing that the same dog developed originally somewhere in the then populous Euphrates valley. From the times of the Romans through the Dark Ages no record has been left of the development of the dog, but from early tapestries and paintings we note a big variety of them. The heavy dog of the Assyrians comes down into medieval times as the mastin of the French and the mastiff of the English; the coursing dog of the Egyptians, long 18 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG and leggy, has his counterpart in the Scottish deerhound and the greyhound, while the hounds of St. Hubert (11th century) were quite evidently what we would call bassets to-day. The English greyhound was a much smaller and shorter legged dog than to-day and his name meant ‘‘badger’’ hound, later developed for speed in coursing hares as the badger grew scarce. In point of fact, even the cave man knew enough to mate fast dogs to- gether to establish a racing type, heavy ones for war dogs, small ones for lap dogs, ete., and for this reason many breeds have been developed by a simple process of selection, Just as we can breed out a bulldog cross on spaniels in eight genera- tions. Some of the old breeds have become extinct, such as the Irish wolfhound and the staghound, the former of which was re-established not over a hundred years ago, and the latter never having been restored, its nearest representative to-day being the Scottish deerhound. On the Continent the name ‘‘hound’’ was applied to all dogs; in England to hunting dogs only, the Saxon word ‘*dog’’ covering all breeds. Owing to the change in type to meet new forms of chase, the breeds of the times of the knights looked little like the ani- mals which bear the same name to-day, and many HISTORICAL NOTES 19 of the old names have been dropped. Of Shake- speare’s ‘‘Mastiff, greyhound, mongrel grim, hound or spaniel, brach or lym’’ how many sur- vive as they were to-day? The brach was the old name for the coursing hound, the lym for the tracker. ‘‘Spaniel’’? meant three types of dogs, represented to-day by the springer, setter and water spaniel. The spaniel, undoubtedly brought from Asia to Spain by the Saracens, was first mentioned in books by Gaston de Foix, a French count who was a master huntsman with his county adjoining the Spanish frontier. His book, ‘‘Livre de Chasse,’’ written in 1387, mentions the spaniel as the ‘‘hound for the hawk,’’ describing a dog very like the modern field spaniel, the same as the ancient springer whose duty was to spring the game for the hawk. Once a-wing, the hawk would bring him down. Quoting Gaston de Foix :—‘‘It is a good thing for a man that hath a noble goshawk or a tiercel to have such hounds. Also when they are taught to be cheins couchant (I give the exact French so you can get the signifi- cance of it) they are good to take partridges and quail with the net. And also they are good when they are taught to swim for fowls when they have dived... .’’ Here, before 1387, we have the beginnings of all three modern dogs, the 20 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG springer, setter and the water spaniel, all devel- oped from a silky coated, white or speckled dog with a docked tail (even then) which was feath- ered if allowed to grow. The battle of Crécy was fought in 1342; Poictiers in 1356, and no doubt Gaston de Foix came up from his huntings in the south of France to take part as a mailed knight in both of these battles. A print in Count de Foix’s old book shows three of his spaniels, a large wavy coated dog with long bushy tail looking something like a modern setter, two coursing hounds, and two lyms or tracking hounds, both pairs drop- eared. The spaniels are shown springing into the air on hind toes with fore feet outstretched, much as a cocker spaniel does to-day, and barking, evi- dently scaring birds into flight for the talons of the hawk. In 1576 Dr. Caius describes all three spaniels as different varieties, ‘‘The Dogge called the Setter or Canis Index, and the Dogge called the Water Spaniell or Canis Aquaticus,’’ being described as to appearance and usage at great length. We quote his description of the setter of 1576. ‘‘An- other sort of dogge be there, seruiceable for fowl- ing, making no noise either with foote or tongue, while they followe the game. These attend dili- gently vpon theyr master and frame theyr condi- HISTORICAL NOTES 21 tions to such becks, motions, and gestures as it shall please him to exhibit and make, either going forward or drawing backeward, inclining to the right hand or yealding to the left. When he hath founde the byrde he keepeth sure and fast silence, he stayeth his steppes and will procede no further, and with a close, couert, watching eye layeth his belly to the grounde and so creepeth forward like a worme. When he approacheth neere to the place where the byrde is, he layeth him downe and maketh a marke of his paws, betrayeth the place of the byrdes last abode, whereby it is supposed that this kind of dogge is called Index, setter, be- ing indeede a name most consonant and agreeable to his quality.’’ Sounds like a page from Field and Stream, describing the work of a setter this year of grace 1918, yet this was before they began ‘‘shooting flying’’ at all, the first arquebuses used in birding being of date around 1583, when that beautifully inlaid, gem-incrusted, light hunting arquebus was made for Henry IV of France. The water spaniel was bred for close woolly coat and used much as in present times, to retrieve ducks, chase ‘‘crips,’’ and besides to retrieve float- ing arrows and crossbows bolts, which function has of late fallen into some disuse. In general he has changed little from that early date in ap- 22 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG pearance, not nearly so much as has the setter. With the introduction of wing shooting with arquebuses and the decline of hawking, the pointer came forward. Hounds of the foxhound size were employed to find single birds, which were then flushed and shot on the wing. The setter was still kept for net service, which was, curiously enough, considered the higher form of sport and the more aristocratic (probably because of the then newness of wing shooting for single birds!). In one of the old books occurs the following odd line: ‘‘The setter cannot be degraded into a pointer, but the pointer may be elevated to a setter, though of sec- ond class.’’ This idea probably had its origin in the fact that the pointer could not then be de- pended upon to be staunch; in fact, was required both to find and flush birds, which would never do in a setter, who had to hold his point while the netters went around on the other side of the covey and drew the net, the birds rising away from the dog, and thus flying right into the net. Only the best table birds were selected from a catch, and a balance maintained between cocks and hens caught, the rest being liberated, so the ancient sport of netting quail was not as unsportsmanlike as it looks. Once scattered in thick brush the pointer came into his own, and as soon as wing shooting HISTORICAL NOTES 23 became a fine art, about 1690, the net was aban- doned and the setter followed him as a gun dog. Modern English setter history begins with Ed- ward Laverack’s book, ‘‘The Setter,’’ published about 1835. By that time the breed, as we now know it, had been well established from the setting spaniel of 1600, and a number of notable strains had been established by the sporting nobility of England. In these latter days, after all the rum- ble-bumble about Laveracks and Llewellins has died down, it seems curious that those earnest con- troversialists should have overlooked the fact that Mr. Laverack did not have the only strain of Eng- lish setters, but only one among many. There are hundreds of thousands of setters to-day who owe their descent to neither the Laverack nor the Llewellin strain. True, Mr. Laverack did get up a happy nick that gave him dogs which could sweep all before them at the English field trials, and so were in great demand, but he did not, in the nature of things, produce from his two dogs Ponto and Old Moll, more than a very small per- centage of all the English setters in ‘‘blighty.”’ However, from these two came Pride of the Bor- der and Countess, two notable dogs; besides Dash, Dash II, Old Blue and Fred IV. Between Ponto and Dash II are six generations, thirty-nine years 24 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG of breeding, during which time a large family of prize English setters were developed in Mr. La- verack’s kennels. The dogs which interest us of this strain were Pride of the Border and Fairy, which latter came over in whelp to Blue Prinee, a son of Pride of the Border. Forty-six of their descendants in this country became well-known dogs and established the Laveracks here. Later more Laveracks came over, Albert’s Ranger, Al- bert’s Woodeock, the Vandergrift dogs bearing the kennel prefix Queen (such as Queen’s Place Pride, Queen’s Flora, ete.), and then the Bloomfield Ken- nels, Mallwyd Sirdar, Stylish Sergeant, Dido B., Mepal’s Queen B., Pera, ete., from which we can pick up and place many of the kennel names on present-day pedigrees. Meanwhile Mr. Llewellin’s dogs, starting with Count Wind’em, Count Noble and Gladstone, made a tremendous drive in America. They were born field trial dogs, full of speed and sagacity, and their get established the Llewellins over here. This is gone into more thoroughly in our chapter ‘*Who’s Who in Bird Dogs,’’ but for the purposes of this historical chapter it will suffice to point out that a great deal of harm was done to the true setter type by judges giving great field trial win- ners place above those bred true to type. The HISTORICAL NOTES 25 Llewellins were bred to great field dogs, regard- less of conformation or bench points and, while this was a good thing for quail-shooting dogs all over the country, it should have had no place in a judge’s estimate of a dog’s worth as a true type of English setter. There has been a lot of argument about the name Llewellin as being unfair, because a lot of dogs under that name have no right to it as not being descended from the first Duke-Rhoebe cross with the Laveracks. This is all beside the mark; the name Llewellin is very much needed, in describing a division of the English setters, bred for field trial work and not necessarily conforming to bench-show standards, and if it should be named after any one that man should certainly be Mr. Purcell Llewellin, who established this remark- able strain as a fact in the sporting world. The Gleam dogs, the Whitestones, and a lot of others are not true Llewellins, but this has little to do with the matter. Time and again an outcross of Laverack or other English setter stock has been beneficial in improving the original Liewellin blood, therefore by all means let us have the cross, and yet class the dog as a Llewellin, this being still his principal characteristic. Many of the field trial winners to-day are great little game finders and great setters, but if they are true English set- 26 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG ters, bred to the fixed type of the animal, then the present bench-show winners are not setters! The sportsman of to-day will bear in mind that for our widespread quail covers we need a dog of the Llewellin type, bred for generations for fast wide- ranging work; for grouse and all close covert work the English or Laverack setter will give him better satisfaction as he is closer to English fore- bears used to that kind of shooting. The history of the pointer starts with firearms used for fowling, the type having been begun as a breed about 1650. Early prints and paintings of the date of 1530 show a smooth-haired houndy dog on point at ducks and birds with one forepaw raised, while the hunters creep up on the birds with matchlocks. These birds were shot sitting, the dogs being used to find the birds and point them, and this was undoubtedly the original pointer. In 1711 the poet Gay wrote: “See how the well-taught pomter leads the way, The scent grows warm; he stops; he springs the prey; The fluttering coveys from the stubble rise And on swift wing divides the sounding skies; The scattering lead pursues the certain sight And death in thunder overtakes their flight.’’ HISTORICAL NOTES 27 This was shortly after the introduction of the flintlock as a fowling piece. It was invented in 1630, but did not come in to stay until the latter half of the sixteen hundreds, and this poem is one of the earliest mentions of wing shooting. A very good pointer is shown in a painting of date 1786, white with black saddle and ticks, of good conformation and much like our modern animal, showing how far he had progressed since 1711. Like the setter, the pointer was a standard gun- dog breed in the kennels of the great lords, and so a number of notable strains were developed, such as the Duke of Kingston’s black pointers, Col. Hamilton’s double-nosed Spanish pointers, the rough-coated Russian pointers owned by the Earl of Powis, ete. A great number of Spanish and Portuguese pointers were brought to England and crossed on the native stock. The Spanish pointer was heavy-bodied and small-headed in comparison to his size, and his influence shows to-day in the heavy buttocks of many of our pointer families. Crossing foxhounds and setters on pointers to get a faster dog was much practiced; at that time the owners seeming to care little for the very much better plan of selective breeding from the type itself—so little were the laws of heredity and atavism known. 28 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG In 1807 the pointer became fairly well typed, Col. Thornton’s Pluto and Juno being character- istic specimens, heavy-bodied dogs with small heads and ears. Pluto was jet black and Juno lemon and white, but there were plenty of tri- colours even before that time. His dog Dash be- came famous and sold for some $1,200. He had one-third cross of foxhound with a correspond- ingly brushy stern, carried hound fashion, but this seems to have been no particular detriment. Modern pointer history begins with Ch. Bang. This remarkable dog flourished about 1879-80, and there is hardly a pointer to-day which does not trace back to old Bang along at least one line, generally two or three in-crosses of him, Jingo, Mainspring, Ch. Mike, Ch. Priam, Young Bang, Rip-Rap, and King of Kent are all Bang dogs. All the Graphic, Croxteth, and Vandervort’s Don dogs are descendants of Bang. In our chapter on ‘“Who’s Who in Gun Dogs,’’ if you turn to the pedigree of Rags Royal Pauper you will find that all the sires and most of the dams in his fifth gen- eration ancestors are Bang dogs, son or grandson of the old boy. With that pedigree in hand, and this chapter, you have the whole history of the pointers, from the pointing hounds down to the present stud dogs, spread out in an unbroken HISTORICAL NOTES 29 genealogy. Bang himself was a son of Hamlet out of Vesta. These dogs in turn trace back to Juno. Of other prominent pointers, whose names you will come across in pedigrees contemporaneous with Bang, are Beulah, dam of the great Beau- fort; and Sensation, grandson of Hamlet. Beau- fort is another Bang dog, being out of Beulah by Bow, son of Bang, and Sensation is still another of the same line, being descended from Hamlet, father of Bang. Turning now to the hounds, we find back in 1646 beagles, harriers, greyhounds (the old badger hound), brachs or coursing hounds like the Scot- tish deerhound, and lyms, trackers like our mod- ern bloodhounds and coonhounds. The painting by David Teniers of that date shows how much the game and fish caught by the lords’ hunting estab- lishment had to do with his meat supply. The butcher in those days had little trade. The noble’s land, with its sea frontage and brooks full of game fish, produced all the meat needed, and it was conserved from year to year so that there was a plentiful supply. The head faleoner had charge of all this work, and an important person- age he was, too. The ancient appeal of this living from the land’s bounty in wild life, as well as on its agricultural product, moved Teniers to make 30 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG a painting of his own kitchen, showing the head faleoner surrounded by his dogs receiving the day’s toll of fish and game. Older men, the fisher- men, are bringing in salmon and sea fish, while young and lusty varlets, the under hunters and game keepers, attend to wildfowl, hares, haunches of venison, partridges and pheasants, all of which are shown in the greatest profusion. The dogs are interesting as showing distinct types of beagles, harriers, and coursers, looking very like the modern greyhound. The older grey (badger) hound, a leggy dog, thin and wiry, yet not over knee high, is also in the picture. Foxhounds and beagles interest us principally as being the two great American hunting dogs, for the useful and ubiquitous coonhound was later developed as a foxhound and bloodhound cross, while the beagle is bred both small for rabbits and large, almost a counterpart of the harrier, for hunting snowshoe hare in our northern tier of states. In 1735 the first foxhound came to be known as a distinct breed for coursing and track- ing foxes. The greyhound alone would not do; he had to be crossed with a tracker to give him the necessary scent. During the nineteenth century breeding to type was carried on extensively, and numerous hunt packs were established all over HISTORICAL NOTES 31 England, while the Henry strain was started by importation in America. Washington’s hounds, like those of most of the Virginia gentry, were importations from England and Ireland, which, when worked in this country under our own con- ditions, gave rise to a faster, rangier type of dog, more suited to our own country, and selection from their descendants gave rise to the type American foxhound, now recognised as distinct from the English, and not judged from the same standards. This breed, and the development from it of the coonhounds, will be treated in the chap- ter on Who’s-Who in Fur Dogs. The beagle is a very old breed of hounds, being first mentioned in 1475, when he was, as now, the poor man’s dog for coursing rabbits. In America he is an institution, for no better rabbit dog ever lived, and we use him for all small game as the terrier is used in England. In 1558 the beagle had become well patronised by royalty and was painted by court painters, so that we know his type to have been already well established, a small hound with long, drooping ears, short pudgy body and throaty neck. Queen Elizabeth had a kennel of them, and one hundred years later George the Third (well beloved of these American colonists) had a paint- ing made of himself with his beagle pack. They 32 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG appear to be small hounds, true to type, and a later painting of date 1800 shows Col. Thornton’s beagles, quite the same as the modern bench win- ners. Their history in America begins with Gen- eral Rowett, of Carlinsville, Ill, who got some of the very best stock to be had in England, and a Rowett beagle became the most sought-for of dogs by our own breeders. This takes us down to the recent history of the breed, carried on down to present stud dogs in the chapter on Whos-Who in Fur Dogs. A brief summary of the two spaniels will con- clude this chapter. Of course, the first hunting spaniel was the springer or hawking spaniel, an active, noisy, rather large dog of the spaniel type, whose work was to spring birds for the hawk. With the introduction of firearms a smaller, quieter dog was wanted, and the cocker (or, as previously called the ‘‘cocking spaniel’’) was got by selective breeding. Coming along at the same time as the setting spaniel, which later became the setter, was the water spaniel, now seen in the modern Norfolk and Irish water spaniel. The springer had nothing to do with the mod- ern Welsh spaniel or springer, but was named for his function in hunting, and from him was devel- oped the modern field spaniel. This dog has had ] : q f HISTORICAL NOTES 33 an unbroken line of popularity, particularly in England, but it was not standardised as a type until 1876, which brings it too far down into pres- ent-day history for this chapter. The cocker de- veloped with the flint lock, considerable mention of him being found in works dating from 1725 to 1813, when he had much the same characteristics as now, a low, broad, short-legged, long-haired dog. In general the cocker remained a small edition of the springer until about 1880, when attention was given to breeding to a fixed standard and a nice lot of dogs began to be shown in America. By that time the Obo strain had been well established in England, and Obo II came over, a puppy im- ported in utero, dam Chloe II by Obo. To Obo II we owe the present excellence of the cockers of America. At the same time were imported Miss Obo II and Obo Jr., which gave further impetus to the strain, and succeeding these came the Cana- dian-bred Black Duke, the best cocker shown in America. Duke Royal, son of Ch. Romany Rye, set the pace on the Pacific Coast, and succeeding these came Black Pete and Doc, who later became the property of Mr. Wilmerding. Doc sired Red Doe and La Tosca, two more good ones, and this brings us down to present-day pedigrees, treated more at length in the chapter ‘‘Who’s-Who in 34 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG Bird Dogs.’’ It should be noted that when Doe went to Mr. Wilmerding he became the property of a sportsman who worked him on game, thus reviving the useful side of the cocker. Not one in fifty spaniels to-day ever see a covert or scent game, so that no wonder their progeny are gun- shy, poor hunters, and require a lot of careful training. Yet all over the east there is no better hunter for cock and grouse than this same cocker. The water spaniel is so odd in every particular that he represents a wider development from the original spaniels than even the setter. Big, rangy, with tight curly hair, a spike tail with no brush, this is an odd, specialised type that has come down to us through many centuries. Except for colour of coat and a few minor points, there is not much to differentiate the Norfolk and Irish water span- iel; to us Americans they may be the same dog. The Irish is red, in solid colour, the Norfolk, liver and white, with liver ticks and with no topknot over the smooth part of the face. Both are won- derful water dogs; and have it in their blood since the earliest hunting times, when they were sent out not only for game, but for arrows and bolts, and were even required to dive after fowl that had escaped the hawk, or had been wounded and had clung to the bottom after the fashion of ducks. ati Sg Pad | si gg pc Peace HISTORICAL NOTES 35 Used for hunting exclusively, they suffered from no degradation to mere bench-show breeding, and puppies got to-day can be depended upon to be wonderful hunters, with good nose and all the af- fectionate spaniel traits. Here is a description of him written by Dr. Caius in 1570. ‘‘This kinde of dogge is properly called Aquaticus, a water span- iel, because he frequenteth and hath usual recourse to the water where all his game & exercise lyeth, namely waterfowles, which are taken by the helpe and seruice of them in their kind. And princi- pally ducks and drakes, whereupon he is lykewise named a dogge for the ducke, because in that quali- tie he is excellent. With these dogges also we fetche out of the water such fowle as be stung to death by any venomous worme, we vse them also to bring vs our boultes & arrowes out of the water (missing our markett) whereat we directed our leuell, which otherwise we should hardly recouer, and oftentimes they restore to vs our shaftes which we thought never to touche or handle againe, after they were lost, for which circum- stances they are called Inquisitores, searchers and finders.’’ That was 350 years ago, but you will find the water spaniel just as good a duck dog now as then. In America only a few years ago Mr. James 36 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG Watson, the famous dog authority, wrote that, ‘‘It is almost as a curiosity that we must now view the Irish water spaniel, and not as an essential in wildfowl shooting,’’ yet of late years conditions have changed and we must now have either him or the Chesapeake. The latter is well described in our chapter on special bird-dog families, as are also the Irish water spaniels now at stud. Before them came such dogs as Barney, Mike, Skidmore’s Shamrock, Judy, Old Irish Nell, and The O’Dono- ghue. Mr. Olcott also had Chippewa Belle, a daughter of Irish Queen, who was by Barney. Chippewa’s sire was Dan, who was by Ch. Mike, the Shamrock dog. Mr. Carson later brought out Marguerite and Musha, and then came Dan Malone, while Ch. Poor Pat and Erin’s Float, brought over by the Rev. T. Moore Smith of Scotch Plains, N. J., brings us down to present-day stud dogs. Of the griffons and retrievers there is little to mention here, the early history of these breeds be- ing covered in the chapter Who’s-Who in Bird Dogs, and of the special divisions of setters, span- iels and the like, most of them belong to such re- cent bench standards as to deserve no particular mention in a general historical treatise. The above will give the dog-loving sportsman a fairly HISTORICAL NOTES 37 good panoramic view of the evolution of his favourite breeds. Like the gun, and the art of hunting itself, it is a story going far back into the dim past, so far beyond the earliest records of science and agriculture that we have only to glimpse that shadowy figure of the Taigal man and his dingo dogs, who visited Australia in Pleis- tocene times, to realise, not only how ancient is man, but how ancient, also, is his trusty dog. CHAPTER II WHO’S WHO IN BIRD DOGS Tue life of a dog is but a short span of years and for that reason the champion of to-day be- comes the stud dog of to-morrow and shortly we hear no more of him. Meanwhile his name and fame has crept into books which far outlive his brief existence, and the dog’s name graces numer- ous pedigrees; his fame is secure in imperishable type and the world knows that here is, or was, a great dog and a mighty sire. The sportsman owning a fine bitch decides to raise some pups to keep for him her good qualities after she will have passed away, and the question of what dog to send her to at once presents itself. To the regular breeder this is no quandary; he has at his finger- tips the names of all the producing sires in the country and just what blood strains they repre- sent, and the advertising pages of his favourite kennel magazines bristle with stud-dog cards, so © that he can pick and choose at will. But to the 38 WHO’S WHO IN BIRD DOGS _ 39 average sportsman who does not specialise in dog breeding, yet owns a few trusty canine hunting companions, the problem of how to breed his bitch and where to send her is quite difficult to solve. The sportsman’s interests centre around his guns, rods, canoes, outdoor gear, boats, dogs—every- thing in the wide world of the great outdoors, and he must know a little about each without specialis- ing particularly on anything. To learn where to breed his dog he refers to the dog books in his library, but, while these are full of the names of champions of yesterday, and lay down the pedi- gree lines of all the well-known dog strains, vir- tually every dog mentioned in the book turns out to be either dead or retired, or, if still in the stud, too old to produce really good pups. Even the stud advertisements of the present-day papers are practically reek to the average sportsman; the names mean nothing to him beyond that the dog is evidently famous, though of what family he comes is a sealed book to the sportsman, though plain as daylight to the breeder. Again, it depends upon what you want the dog for, if an intelligent selection of a sire is to be made. To send your grouse and woodcock bitch to a champion field trial sire, bred for speed and quail in the open, is to invite trouble, for the re- 40 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG sulting pups will be far below their mother’s standard as grouse dogs. You do not want range and speed in a thick cover dog; you want, rather, a dog that will work close; quiet and catlike; with a keen nose for the faint grouse scent—and the rest is experience. So send her to a grouse sire if you want pups that will be natural grouse hunt- ers, easy to train. Another consideration is to avoid inbreeding and the constitutional weakness that is the sure result of it, for you do not want to lose your dog from distemper after spending a lot of time and money on him and giving him a place in your heart that will ache for many a year after he is gone. If dam and sire are of the same immediate ancestors the pups will be badly inbred, but if of different families, harking back to remote common ancestors with many outcrosses, you can count on strong, hardy pups that will also be good hunters. But do not look for the exact qualities or markings of either dam or sire in them. The family traits will be reproduced with exact fidel- ity, but the individual pups will take after grand- sire, granddams, ancestors of the third and fourth generation, etc., one or two of them perhaps being good copies of the dam and sire themselves, though even then possibly not he their mental traits. WHO’S WHO IN BIRD DOGS 41 A little history will be first in order, after which the family position of various dogs now in the stud will be more clear in the reader’s mind. Be- ginning with the English setters, we will confine ourselves to the Llewellin or field trial setter, in- eluding the Laverack outcrosses, as many good bird dogs have been recruited from the ranks of the latter also. Many of the field trial setters of to-day are half Llewellin and half ‘‘English’’ as the generic name for a Laverack outcross from the original Llewellin stock is termed by breeders. This does not impair their hunting qualities at all but rather improves their physical stamina and mental makeup. The straight Llewellin stock de- scends from a few dogs originally imported into our country from Mr. Llewellin’s strain of dogs originated by him in England, which strain, the famous Duke-Rhoebe-Laverack cross, showed so many fine field qualities that they became instantly popular here. The blood of these dogs is in nearly all the great field trial dogs that have won stakes here in the past two decades. The first famous Llewellins imported here were Gladstone and Count Noble, the latter a son of the great Count Wind’em of England. By Count Noble came Ch. Count Gladstone IV, who, to- 42 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG gether with Roderigo, Gath’s Hope and Gath’s Mark, founded a great strain of American field dogs. These were by the happy combination of Gladstone’s daughters bred to Count Noble, and established high-class setters once for all in our country, for, look at the long list of great dogs bred from these four. To Roderigo we owe, via Antonio, Jessie Rodfield, Lanark Lad and Tony Boy, to whom in turn we owe a number of great dogs such as Ch. Mohawk I, ‘‘the blazing soul of Roderigo,’’ from whom come the Babblebrooks of to-day. To Count Gladstone IV we owe Ch. Lady’s Count Gladstone, Count Danstone, Ch. Sioux and Prime Minister (from whom we get Count Bloodstone and Momoney of to-day). The first two of these dogs are not straight Llewellin, to the purist’s point of view, as their dam was Dan’s Lady, who has Dash III’s blood in her, a Laverack dog out of a Laverack dam, making a straight outcross, yet Lady’s Count Gladstone gave us Jessie Rodfield’s Count Gladstone and Count Whitestone, and the latter gave us Ch. Pio- neer and Ch. Prince Whitestone. At the same time Count Danstone sired a number of famous dogs now in the stud. Both of them are now classed by all breeders as straight Llewellin, the outcross being so far back. WHO’S WHO IN BIRD DOGS 438 We must not forget the great producing dams in this sketch of the setter families. Gath’s Mark gave us Ouida F., mother of Dolly Manners by Tony Boy, which latter dam (Dolly) gave us Cesar and Dolly Manners IJ. Gladstone, bred to Ruby II, gave us Ruby’s Girl, the mother of Count Gladstone IV and Ouida F. Jessie Rod- field, Antonio’s granddaughter, was granddam to a number of noted dogs such as Count Whitestone and Jessie Rodfield’s Count Gladstone. The six- generation pedigree of Blue Danstone’s Duke, printed herein, gives a very good bird’s-eye view of all the noted setter families which we have been discussing and is a typical Llewellin setter pedi- gree. Turning to dogs now in the stud we note such names as Doc Whitestone, Gleam’s Gladstone Max, the Babblebrooks, Eugene M., Boaz, Master Rodfield, Stedman’s Count Whitestone, Count Bloodstone, Momoney and Momoney II, Free Lance, Master Ben, Sport Hiki, Ch. Candy Kid, Ch. Benstone, etc. Who are they? The very names of many of them place them at once. Doce. Whitestone (Count Whitestone-Marian Mills II). The Gleam dog, son of Count Gleam, who was a son of Ch. Lady’s Count Gladstone, the original Gleam being a Laverack (Lincoln-Blake); the 44 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG Babblebrooks, sons of Ch. Mohawk IT; Momoney (Prince Algonquin, son of Prime Minister-Una, daughter of Mohawk IL); Master Ben, son of Marse Ben, a Gleam dog; Sport Hiki, another Gleam dog; Eugene M., national champion; Ch. Candy Kid, second in the All-America in 1916 (Vallejo-Bond’s Gypsy), a Pacific Coast breeding; Free Lance (Mohawk IJ-Lady Freakstone) ; Mas- ter Rodfield (Ruby’s Dan Il-Marie’s Sports Top- sey); Ch. Benstone (Ch. Ct. Whitestone-Mayme Gilchrist—a daughter of Marse Ben). In all this welter of Llewellins we must not for- get the Laveracks, which are the setter fountain head. Alongside the characteristic black ears and partly black head, with white parting line and the prominent forehead stop so characteristic of the field trial setter, we must ever bear in mind that long, lean head, all white with tan spots, tan ears and gentle forehead stop, which speaks the Laverack dog. For, as many of these pedigrees show it is the Laverack cross that saves the Llewellin from inbreeding and invariably pro- duces the great dog of the next generation. Look at the original Gladstone bitches, full of Laverack blood which, bred to Count Noble, produced the heads of our winning setter families in America. WHO’S WHO IN BIRD DOGS 45 Look at the Count Whitestone bitches, of some 50 per cent Laverack blood through Queen Stella, bred to Mohawk sires to-day to produce Derby winners. And some of the best grouse dogs in the country have been straight Laveracks, notably Sir Roger de Coverly, Ch. Deodora, Albert’s Mallwyd Mixture, Ch. La Besita, recent national champion. During the last two years the notable preponder- ance of pointer wins in the field trials has been due undoubtedly to too great inbreeding of Llewellins, while the increase in setter wins of 1915 and 1916 shows up clearly, in the fresh out- crossing of Laverack blood. In general it would be the best side to lean to, in breeding grouse dogs for eastern woods shooting; by all means send your Llewellin bitch to a noted Laverack grouse dog or his get if you don’t want to have the dis- gust of hollering your head off at a wide ranger who makes more noise in the dry leaves and flushes more grouse than you will see in a day’s march, which will likely be your fate if your pup is of straight field trial stock. Taking the pointers of to-day we need not go much farther back than four or five great names that began to compete with the setters success- fully some seven years ago. Fishel’s Frank, 46 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG Hard Cash, Manitoba Rap, Alford’s John, Jingo, Hal Pointer—these are the dogs we really started with. They began with imported King of Kent, Mainspring, Hops and Pontiae. King of Kent and Hops gave us Rip Rap, who starred in the field trials of 1889, becoming finally field champion. Hard Cash owns Jingo and Hal Pointer as grand- parents. Fishel’s Frank is a combination of Jingo and Rip Rap (Fishel’s Rip Rap-Boy’s Queen, a Jingo dog); Alford’s John, the great dis- covery, is of Lad of Kent extraction, his father be- ing Dave Kent. He was discovered and brought into the field trial limelight by the merest accident, and his get are among the prominent winners to- day. Manitoba Rap is by Ripple, ex Lady Cy- rano, the former a grandson of Rip Rap, and Lady a daughter of King Cyrano. Turning to the dogs now in the stud, we find Silver Sides (Ch. Mani- toba Rap-King’s Sister), Ch. Comanche Frank (Fishel’s Frank-Lady Johns, a daughter of Al- ford’s John), Rags Royal Pauper (Hard Cash- Alford’s Royal Pauper), which ought to place him as a grandson of Alford’s John, the royal pauper of dogdom. Then there is Champion John Proc- ‘tor (Fishel’s Frank-Miss Mariutch), Security (Hard Cash-Alford’s Royal Rags), one of the best WHO’S WHO IN BIRD DOGS 47 ever brought out, and Lewis C. Morris, the cham- pion of to-day (Fishel’s Frank-Bessatina). This gives a fair line on the pointer families in the lead to-day, and the sportsman wishing to breed his bitch can choose from any of them not of his own direct line and avoid in- breeding, yet get a high-class field dog for the sire. Now, who won in the 1916 big field events? Be- ginning with the United States Field Trials, held at Grand Junction, Tenn., first was won by Joe Muncie, a white and lemon setter dog by Jack Muncie ex Miss Mathews. Second place was taken by Lewis C. Morris, the Fishel’s Frank pointer just described. Third was won by Secur- ity, the pointer combination of Hard Cash and Alford’s John via Alford’s Royal Rags. In the Derby, the dogs whelped after January 1st of the year previous, insuring the competitors to be pup- pies in their first year, first was won by Kirk’s Buss (Wise’s Ruby’s Sport-Kirk’s Maude), a Llewellin-Laverack white and orange setter dog; second by Naponechee (Dan Piedmont-Lady Reyno), a Llewellin; while third was divided be- tween Commissioners O’Crahu (Commissioner- Count Whitestone’s Lady Alice), which places him, and Rap’s Pansy Blossom (Manitoba Rap- QUAIL RS ON SOUTHERN POINTE TWO Blue Danstone (4210) Won 2nd Alabama all age stakes 1902,and5th Nebraska all age 1903,also many times bench win- ner. Decatur Bell A great pro- ducer of many high class and noted shoot- ing dogs, Dr. W. M. Beck of Clarkfield, Minn., her owner, says she is a per- | fect type, beautifully marked and has a won- derful nose. Says she “picks ’em up” after the other dogs have gone by. F. D.S. B. 29359. Whelped May 14, 1911 BLUE DANSTONE’S DUKE Ch. Count Dan- stone (3490) 3 times a field trial winner in{ 3 starts and a sire of 17 win- ners. Tairland Dot (6468) A celebrated brood bitch who is the dam of many noted dogs. Lady’s Count Gladstone’s Count (6511) Bench wins in- clude 3rd limit Hamilton1906: 2nd field trial class Fort Wayne 1907; 3rd in South- ern age stake 1906. Foxy Warfield A grand indi- vidual and ex- cellent brood bitch. Ohio all} Ch. Count Gladstone IV (Ch. Count Noble Had 9 wins including ! the National Cham- pionship 1896, and a sire of 41 winners who won 89 times. He has a monument erected to him in California that cost about $800. | Dan’s Lady Winner of 4 field trials and dam of 9 field trial and bench winners. Ch. Tony Boy (541) winner and a sire of many winners. He was one of the great- est winners and pro- ducer of his day. You all know him. Ouida F. Little sister to the | noted winners “Al- lene,” ‘Marks Ruby,” and dam of Dolly Manners and Jessie Perry and other well known dams. Ch. Lady’s Count Glad- stone (1900) Had 3 field trial wins including the National Championship 1900; a sire of 49 winners in- cluding the noted Ch. Count Whitestone. His get has won 96 times at public trials and more to hear from. {Count Wind’em One of the greatest setters ever imported. ( 13 times a field trial | Lizzie Rhoades A grand bitch. shooting Rod Warfield (3083) Twice a field winner. | High Land Bell (6198) A great producer of high class shooting dogs. Sired 36 winners. Ruby’s Girl A producer of 6 who Nora Gladstone won 26 times. Sister to Ch. Sue. (Ruby 11 Gladstone Dan Gladstone Ghuste (0 ’ Dally. Bursess Geree Aa Roderigo Ch. Antonio Had 5 field trials, 9 bench wins and sired 26 winners. Laundress Gath’s Mark Had 4 wins and a sire of 17 winners. Ruby’s Girl A producer of 6 who won 26 times. Sister to Ch. Sue. Ch. Count Gladstone IV See above. Dan’s Lady See above. Ch. Rodfield (192) Winner of 4 field trials, and sire of the field trial winners “Oakley Hill,” “Ortez Lad” and 36 other winners with 95 wins. Catherine Glynn Ch. Rodfield (192) See above. Louise Danstone (287) Count Ladystone Nellie Noble (2551) THE LLEWELLIN HIERARCHY AT A GLANCE Had 81 wins and sire of 27 winners. The greatest set- ter ever import- ed. Bo Peep Roi D’Oir Belle of Piedmont Gath Gem Gladstone Ruby 11 Ch. Count Noble See above. Ruby’s Girl See above. Dan Gladstone Lilly Burgess Ch. Antonio See above. Nellie Hope J Kingston Lucille’s Nell Antonio See above. Nellie Hope Ch.Count Danstone (3490). See above. Marks Spot Count GladstonelV See above. Dan's Lady See above. Redfield (192) See above. Florence Gladstone Ch. Ben Law (Ch. Pat Law Clare P Pa( Cloud No. 32297 (Sire)........... aah 5 Ne Ch. St. Clouds Blarney (Rockwood Lady Rockwood Minnie PAPAWEAnE Tobe Killane {Nola Shannon W. (Dam) {Blarney Red Girl Ch. St A WELL-BLOODED IRISH SETTER PEDIGREE Mainspring Jingo Queen III Young Jingo Trinket’s Bang Pearl's Dot Pearlstone Hard Cash (7802) King of Kent Hal Pointer Daisy Brown's Bella Pointer (382) | | | | < Sport of Hessen 2 a Belle of Hessen ZA, Michigan Belle n =) a << (Lad of Kent 0 Ay Dave Kent | Trissler’s Daisy 5 Alford’s John (5346) | {Frank \Cleade Dow’s Nell Alford’s Royal Rags (12741) (King of Kent Hal Pointer | Daisy Hallie Jingo (1241) {Jingo Jingo’s Dot (667) < | Pearl’s Dot Pat Laws Arkansas Belle . Clouds Blarney Rockwood Minnie Salter’s Mike Salter’s Romp Pontiac Kent Queen Croxteth Trinket Bang II Lloyd’s Hebe Priam Kent Baby Bang Bang Zanetta Duke of Hessen Abbess of Kent King Bang Missouri Belle Bracket Renie Duke’s Lad Gem’s Floss Wise Croxeth Fannie H. Bitler’s Duke McDonald’s Nell {Priam Kent Baby Bang Bang Zanetta Mainspring Queen III Trinket’s Bang Pearlstone A TYPICAL ALFORD’S JOHN-HARD CASH POINTER PEDIGREE The Llewellin Setter BOA Z No. 18045 F. D. CHAMPION JESSIE RODFIELD’S COUNT GLADSTONE 5 is<- Stiga eee Full brother to Count Whitestone, Prince Rodney and others; and the greatest field Champion Lady’s | Count Gladstone N trial winner of that famous family of Llewel- << lins. He was the greatest bird-finding | Jessie Rodfield.... ° Llewellin of his day. t DOLEYSMANNERS tiles sss peers seee : f pQ A litter sister of the great Caesar, who is Rancocas Jack .. >) noted for his splendid conformation and his ae style, range and endurance in the eld. Dolly Manners aif A PEDIGREE SHOWING THE CHSAR-RANCOCAS JACK BR LLEWELLINS S. B. Champion Count Gladstone IV Dan’s Lady Champion Rodfield Maude Gladstone Eugene T. Maude L. Tony Boy Ouida F. ANCH OF THE WHO’S WHO IN BIRD DOGS 49 Turning to the grouse dogs, at the New York State trials, first was won by Grouse Bo’ (Victor Bo’-Lady Count Okaw), an orange belton Laver- ack; second by Crawford’s Pennsylvania Tom (Sims Glenwood Boy-Lady Chippewa), a Llewel- lin-Laverack setter dog, and third by Dick, a Co- manche Frank pointer. In the grouse stakes of the Pennsylvania field trials, Lamberton’s Mack (Momoney-Susan Howard), a Llewellin setter, won first; Count Gladstone’s Glad (Lady’s Count Gladstone-Fairland Ruby), another Llewellin, won second; and third was divided between Ida Mae Whitestone (Babblebrook Joe-Lady Nancy Whitestone), a Mohawk-Count Whitestone dog, and Eugym Mohawk (Eugene M.-Wilson’s Betty Whitestone), a Eugene M.-Mohawk blood blend. Of course, in these great events you are bound to meet the champions of to-day, sons and daugh- ters of the champions of yesterday, again and again, as the same dog travels from one event to the next where the stakes are big, and earns much fame and money for his owner. The wins of a big champion may exceed $5,000 in one season. But in the smaller state and local field trials, while you may not find the stars, you will find worthy 50 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG representatives of all the setter and pointer fam- ilies we have discussed, most of whom entered the big events but were not good enough to win. But in their local fields these dogs are generally able to win over the general field, which in its turn is composed almost entirely of Gladstones, Mohawks, Whitestones, Eugene M.’s, Fishel’s Franks, Raps, Hard Cashs, Alford’s John dogs, etc., as the pres- ent-day setters and pointers might be described in general terms. We cannot all afford championship dog fees, but there is no reason at all why a look-over of the winners of any of the dozens of lesser field trials scattered throughout the country should not give us choice of a dog having just the blood lines we want to blend with those of our own dog, and so universal is the distribution of the descendants of the dogs we have been describing that virtually no pointer or setter puppy alleged to be a Llewel- lin which does not show some of the heads of the family in his pedigree is worth bothering with, for pups of the true stock are reasonable in price and the performance of Derby winners of to-day shows the blood to be still potent and the best there is in the country. At the same time plenty of Laverack outcross is not to be feared, particularly in a dog WHO’S WHO IN BIRD DOGS 51 for woodland shooting. Sir Roger, the Lingfields, the Alberts, the Queens, Mallwyds, Wellingtons, Uhlans, Ch. Deodora—these are Laverack names that mean good grouse dogs as well as great bench winners. A glance at the Irish setters, for to my mind a renaissance of that noble breed is about due in our country. For your combined bird dog, salt- water retriever and hunting companion, handsome and easy to keep looking presentable, the Irish- man is hard to beat. The owner of one of the best collections of Irish setters in the country is Mr. Otto Pohl, and his ambition is to place one of them among our field trial winners. This kennel of eight dogs comprises all field hunters, free from the bench-show specialisation that has kept our Irish setters back during the last decade. This tend- ency to specialise has done the fancy lots of harm, as new sportsmen purchasers have been loath to buy Irish setter pups that may not own a hunting sire or dam for three generations back, preferring English that they know will be natural hunters, besides which the reputation for stub- bornness that the Irish setter has accumulated also militates against him. And further, he is hard to see in the woods, which is the only real 52 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG detriment he has. Two Irish stocks come to mind, bred for field service through thick and thin, the Law and St. Cloud stocks, and puppies from them will be natural hunters, as their dams and sires were before them. Both stocks are well repre- sented in the stud to-day, and plenty of pups are for sale, so there is nothing in the way of your owning a red setter if you want a dog for both ducks and upland shooting, no matter whether you live on salt water or in the prairie lake country. A little history, for a starter, and then we can see where we stand with a pedigree such as your dog dealer will likely send you. While Signal and Blue Rock were the ancestors of many of the Irish setters in our country, the stock has been con- tinuously enriched with fresh importations from the ‘‘ould counthry,’’ Finglas coming over some- what later, then Elcho, and of late Morty Oge. Mr. Pohl, one of the foremost fanciers of the Irish setter breed in the country, has recently imported two more dogs of the kennel name Rheola which seem bound to figure in future pedigrees, mingled with his Law and St. Cloud stock. Virtually all the above dogs were champions in their day. Ch. St. Cloud ITI, the greatest of the St. Cloud stock, WHO’S WHO IN BIRD DOGS 53 is a blend of Signal and Elcho, being by Con- naught ex Reddie. Connaught is Kildare-Bessie Glencho, and Reddie, Babe Elcho-Queen S. A typical Elcho dog is Nell Elcho, Fred Elcho (Duke Elcho-Red Rose), ex Red Bess (Finglas-Red Nell), which gives you an idea of the blood lines. The Culbertson Irish setters, of which many rep- resentatives figure in present-day pedigrees, may be sketched in by the pedigree of Alan of Culbert- son, who was by Shamrock Signal (Signal-Flossie Finglas) out of Lady Pat (Patencho-Blue Rock’s Maid). Of the Law stock Ch. Pat Law is Ch. Ben Law-Claire P. A present-day stud dog is St. Cloud’s Kenmore (Ch. Heir at Law-Daisy Law), while Ch. Conn-Law is the head of the family, de- feating the best imported dogs of late years. They all get their peculiar kennel suffix from old Shan Law of Ireland. Mortys Lad, a present-day blend of Law and Morty Oge blood, is Shan Law via his dam Glenariff Patsy, a daughter of Glen- ariff Chieftain and Shan’s Fannie. Ch. Conn-Law is by Ch. Ben Law ex Elcho Bess, which places him accurately enough. Most pup pedigrees that one examines for blood lines to-day contain a good deal of Law, St. Cloud and Morty Oge blood, with perhaps a dash of Rockwood or Culbertson 54 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG appearing in dam or sire somewhere in the pedi- gree, and any pup with such blood in him is an Irishman bred in the purple which will do to train. CHAPTER Iift WHO’S WHO IN HOUND DOGS American hunters are principally interested in three big divisions of hounds—coonhounds, fox- hounds and beagles. They constitute three-quar- ters of all the hunting dogs used in the United States. Of the three kinds, the coonhound is dis- tinctively American, the foxhound Americanised, and the beagle almost unchanged from the fixed English type. The coonhound is distinctly our dog. Used for deer, coons, bear, wild cat and all kinds of treeing ‘‘varmints,’’ he has had as much to do with the development of our country as the pioneer himself. He was the pioneer’s dog in fact, and for the last three centuries has been the hunter’s dog all over the backwoods. In the old days we had to take our meat as we found it, run- ning wild in the forests, for butchers and beeves were not and the English grenadiers that we used to kill for winter meat got scarce after 76. The coonhound started with innumerable hounds brought over by the settlers—French, English and 55 56 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG Spanish strains all being well represented—and from a mixture of them, through a century of training and breeding to high-class performers only, came the American coonhound. The French hound is more like him than any other recognis- able breed to-day; long-eared, rat-tailed, power- ful, gifted with an unequalled nose, he became the well-known ‘‘potlicker’’ or ‘‘smell dog’’ of the South, while the New England and New York hounds, used mostly for deer and fast fur, devel- oped into famous fox-hunting strains, of which the Buckfield, Portsmouth and Pennsylvania are rep- resentative. A good deal of foxhound was crossed in on these latter to give more speed, the Irish hounds of Maryland being used extensively for that purpose, for these were then the best of the old grey foxhounds of the South. In those days hunting the grey fox was the principal sport of the Southern gentry, and from Maryland to Tennessee every wealthy planter had his pack of grey fox dogs. Washington’s favourite entry in his diary, after retirement to Mount Vernon, was ‘“Ketched a fox to-day’’—or two of them if the luck was good! The grey fox was a slow little beast and the long-eared hound was plenty fleet enough. With the introduction of the red fox from England and the North, all this was changed, WHO’S WHO IN HOUND DOGS 57 as ‘‘red’’ could outrun and simply play with these old-time foxhounds, so new blood was imported from England, and the American foxhound as we know him to-day began to develop. Meanwhile, the coonhound went his own ways. His job was different, slow cold trailing, running deer and the like, which called for breeding from great per- formers regardless of colour or family strains, so that the coonhound is not a matter of big names but rather of good strains in his selection for pur- chasing. Davy Crockett, that king of bear and coon hunt- ers, had one of the best packs of the old South- ern coonhound, and, as he gave great numbers of puppies away to political friends, lots of de- scendants of his dogs are extant to-day. His ex- ample was simply an instance of what was going on all over the country, noted hunters giving or selling puppies from their own packs of trained dogs, no stud books being kept, and the result has been an absence of anything like papers of pedi- grees among the coonhounds on sale to-day. That the pup comes of a noted hunting ancestry is about all one has to go on. ‘Two strains are well known, the Redbone, an ancient breed of Southern coon- hound, and the J. EK. Williams dogs. Willams ran a kennel of his own up to about 1911 and kept a 583 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG large pack for his own use, as coon hunting was his favourite recreation. The Redbones, more or less pure, or else crossed on Walker stock, are in existence to-day and still going strong, quite a few kennels advertising them. Of the Northern hounds, the Buckfields orig- inated around the town of Buckfield, Me., and were used for deer driving and fox hunting in the Northern style, that is, the gunner standing on a runway and shooting the fox ahead of the hounds, just as deer are shot in the South. An aside here seems inevitable on the oddities of sectional no- tions regarding the ethics of sport. Your North- ern still-hunter of deer looks with as much horror on the driver of the South as the horse-and-hound man of Kentucky does on the New Englander who would dare to shoot a fox instead of running him toafinish. Really, it is local conditions that gov- ern in both cases, and the ethics are equally sportsmanlike in both. It would be impossible to run a fox with hounds in the Northern mountains; also impossible to still-hunt a deer in the South- ern brushwood. You must have more or less open country to run foxes to horse, and you must have mountainous country to still-hunt deer. The best horse could not keep up with a fox in the Ver- mont hills, so they are shot ahead of the dogs; WHO’S WHO IN HOUND DOGS 59 no man can see a deer thirty yards in the South- ern brush, and so dogs must be used to drive them past stands where one can see to shoot. That is all there is to it, and there is no cause for the hunters of one section to despise those of the other. Getting back to the Northern deer and coon- hounds. The Buckfield strain seems to have orig- inated from a regular old-fashioned trailer dog, Tige, and a fast bitch, Skip, a coarse-haired fox- hound, and therefore, probably one of the Plum- mer or Sugar Loafs which were coarse-haired and brindled in colour. One of the puppies of this mat- ing was the famous Gledhill bitch, who proved a wonderful fox hunter, of endless staying quali- ties and able to work the fox in all kinds of weather. She was bred extensively and is the dam of the Buckfield strain. Among her progeny are Dime Buck, Dime Dansforth, Red Dime, Red Sport and Tomey. The most famous hound of the strain was Jim Blaine, out of the Buckfield bitch, Pert, by a full-blooded Byron hound, of which strain more later. Asa rule the Buckfields are coarse-coated dogs, red or tan, or red and blue mottled, with now and then a black one, a throw- back to old Tige, who was solid black. Of the old Redbones but little is known except 60 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG that they were one of the most prominent ‘‘na- tive’’ southern hound strains, true representatives of the pioneer’s coon and deer hound. No names are available, but there are a number of kennels in the South to-day which breed them more or less pure, and the quality seems as good as ever. The ones we have seen were all large, bony, black and tan hounds, with long ears. Of the J. HE. Wil- hams hounds more is known. Neely was one of his best bitches, a black and white dog, lightly ticked, large and rangy. Other good ones in his pack were Bigun, Dan, Guard, Ruler, Queen, De- liah and Old Tom, and, as the stock is widely dis- persed in the southern and central States and shows up well in the hunting qualities of pups of that blood, it is highly prized by the trapping and night-hunting fraternity. The Pennsylvania hounds are a blend of the old native long-eared Virginia hounds, and the smaller and faster Maryland hounds with much more foxhound blood in them. They are principally used for coon and snowshoe rabbit hunting, and are found all through the mountainous parts of the State, par- ticularly in the southern portion. When we come to the foxhound a mass of his- tory and stud book records confronts us, and the going is much easier. The American foxhound WHO’S WHO IN HOUND DOGS 61 began with the introduction of the red fox into the South. Before that the little grey fox afforded all the riding and was easily trailed by the native pioneer’s hound. It seemed incredible to the gen- try of that period that the red fox could easily lose their best dogs, and some red foxes had to be imported from England to prove it. Followed then importations of regular English foxhounds, which were crossed on our native bitches to give more speed to their progeny. The oldest and best known strain was the Brooke, brought over from England by Sir Roger Brooke, who came over with Lord Baltimore and settled in Maryland. In 1822 Mr. Bolton Jackson imported Mountain and Muse from Ireland and we get most of our fox- hound strains from these and the Brooke dogs, which were extensively crossed. In 1738 a pair of red foxes was brought over by the captain of the tobacco boat Monocacy, and it was their ad- vent into Maryland and the subsequent showing up of our native hounds as too slow that was the direct cause of this importation. The two dogs Mountain and Muse became the property of Gov- ernor Ogle, and their get was bred extensively on the native stock of the fox-hunting gentry of Maryland. One of these hunters, Mr. Gosnell, bred and 62 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG . presented to Mr. Miles Harris, of Georgia, a pair of pups, one of which was the dog July. He proved a sensation as compared to the native hounds of the central South, and so became very famous and was bred to extensively, establishing what is known as the July strain of Georgia fox- hounds. The next famous strain was the Trigg, owned by H. C. Trigg, noted southern hunter. Originally the family owned a pack of the fine old rat-tailed, long-eared, deep-toned Virginia black-and-tan foxhounds, but the advent of the red fox into Ken- tucky changed all that, and the Triggs had to as- semble a new pack. The stock was obtained from Mr. Birdsong in Georgia in 1867. He had then in his pack the famous dog July, and also his Henry dog Longstreet. From him he bought Chase and Bee (by Longstreet), George, Rip and Fannie, paying $400 for the lot. From General Maupin he bought Minnie, a descendant of the noted dog, Tennessee Lead, and from Colonel Walker he got the dog Mattie. The Trigg strain is thus seen to be a blend of the Birdsong, Maupin and Walker stocks. Following out this line of foxhound history, we first see the connection of the Triggs with the original Maryland stock through July, and next WHO’S WHO IN HOUND DOGS 638 in logical order would be the Birdsong dogs. These dogs were developed by Mr. Birdsong from a pack of notable Virginia foxhounds owned by Dr. T. Y. Henry. These were all Mountain-Muse dogs from the Irish Maryland strain, and were used by Dr. Henry principally in deer hunting. Mr. Birdsong then bought the dog July and crossed him on these Henry hounds. Longstreet and Hodo were part of the original Henry pack, and so we get the main outlines of the Birdsong strain. Coming now to the Walkers, these were also old-style grey fox dogs originally, and, with the advent of the red fox, showed the same lack of the needful speed. As Mr. Walker, senior, was a close friend and county neighbour of General Maupin, the first outcross was to Maupin’s Ten- nessee Lead. This dog was a stray, picked up run- ning a deer, but was evidently a foxhound of Eng- lish or Irish descent, very fast and yet having a trailing nose, and he improved the Walker strain immensely. Aside from the importation of Striver and two bitches from England some time later, the Walker strain was kept intact, simply adhering to careful breeding from the best of the Tennessee Lead-Walker pups. This covers the principal American foxhound 64 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG families, with the exception of the Byron strain. About 1850 a club of foxhunters in Petersburg, Pa., imported the English bitch, Clio, to breed her to the famous Maryland dog, Rattler. The mat- ing resulted in four notable puppies, Byron, Music, Rattler IIT and Dido. Byron went to Colonel Tucker, Rattler IL was retained by Colo- nel Starke (the owner of Clio), Music went to Colonel Hampton, of South Carolina, and Dido © went West, where her blood is found in all the best known Kentucky and Tennessee strains. By- ron became very famous and was bred to by the owners of foxhound packs, his name being given to the strain of foxhounds thus sired by him. Into other noted strains, such as the Arkansas Traveller, Wild Goose, Robertson, Whitlock, Avent, Cook, ete., it is not necessary to go further here than to generalise that each was founded by some noted dog, bred on original native stock, the ~ blood of the Maryland, Walker and Birdsong (or July) strains being prevalent in all of them. The Williams strain of to-day was developed in the same way from Walker-Maupin stock, improved by the judicious addition of imported English blood, by General Roger D. Williams, of Ken- tucky. Of his champion dogs we may note Scrape, Jip Sharpe, Barney, Scorch, Lee, ete. My TYPICAL RABBIT BEAGLES—OUT FOR A DAY'S HUNT FOUR CRACK LLEWELLINS—ODESSA (POINTING), LANARK LAD, GYPSY NOBLE AND TONOPAUGH MOMONEY II, A CRACK FIELD TRIAL SETTER THE LLEWELLIN SETTER, “BOAZ” LADY BELLE B—RABBIT BEAGLE AIREDALE TERRIER, CH, ILLUMINATOR “ ALFORD’S JOHN” THE CHAMPION POINTERS, “MANITOBA RAP” AND WHO’S WHO IN HOUND DOGS 65 own dog, Pepper, is by Lee out of Wake, and has won so many ribbons that he is by now a cham- pion himself no doubt. He was carrying every- thing before him in both bench and field trials when last heard from, and is now the property of the Rookwood Kennels of Lexington, Ky. The popular and ubiquitous beagle, rich man’s and poor man’s dog alike, is very plentiful in our country. We have three kinds, the standard 15- inch, the pocket variety about nine inches at the shoulder, and the large beagle which takes after the harrier and stands over twenty inches, mak- ing a good dog for fast snowshoe hare, and good also on plain Molly Cotton-tail. Our first stand- ard beagles were General Rowett’s pack, imported from England, though of just what strain there isnorecord. The dogs of this pack that have had much influence on beagle breeding in America were Warrior, Rosey, Sam and Dolly, who enter into the blood of many of the best beagle strains in America. Rattler was of the mating Warrior- Rosey, and was extensively bred to. Ch. Frank Forrest was the most famous of the New England beagles, and achieved the double championship of both bench and field. Ch. Lee and his son, Bow- man, were also noted beagles of the early nine- ties. Imp. Bellman, mated to another Rowett 66 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG beagle, produced Dan D., winner of the 1902 field trials. In general the Rowetts were cobby black- white-and-tans, heavy boned, with long heads, and they run so true to type that any dog with Rowett blood in him will make a good showing at either field or bench trials. Of the smaller beagles, Ch. Bannerman heads the list, a nine-inch beagle, brought over to coun- teract the American tendency to large size. He was the chief rival of Frank Forrest at that time. Frank Forrest, mated to the imported field bitch Sue Forrest, of the Elmore strain, produced Ch. Clyde, Sunday and Gypsy Forrest. These all produced noted field trial dogs, and Clyde’s son, Trick, made it three straight generations of For- rest field champions beginning with Frank For- rest. Comeroe, of the Elmore strain, was by im- ported Ch. Ringwood, and the strain was crossed on the Rowetts with fine results for both field and bench qualities. Imp. Chimer and Myrtle were brought to Pennsylvania and started another line of beagles which were crossed on the Rowetts and on the combination of Rowett and Elmore, the best dog of the line being Lady Novice; also by Chimer and a Rowett bitch we got Spinaway. Two of her sons, Robino II and Fashion, became WHO’S WHO IN HOUND DOGS 67 leaders in 1902. The small dogs, Bannerman and Blue Cap, developed great steadfastness in rabbit tracking in their get, and the nick was used by many of our present day breeders. CHAPTER IV SPECIAL FIELD DOGS AwnoTHER breed not to be overlooked by Amer- ican sportsmen is the French pointing Griffon. In 1916, for the first time, one of them ran in one of the great field trials and gave such good ac- count of himself that one of the best Llewellins had to stretch himself to make good against him. This Griffon, Homere’s Jack, was run in the National Capitol Field Trials. He drew a crack Eugene M.-Gleam dog, Tip Top Merry Boy (Mike M.-Gleam’s Belle). Every one was anxious to see how the Griffon would make out in comparison with a crack Llewellin. The Frenchman did very well, for, while Merry Boy was full of class and had plenty of speed, the Griffon was right after him. Unfortunately no birds were found during the heat, so the trial was quite inconclusive. Homere’s Jack is by Homere-Fileuse de Merli- mont, a steel-gray pointing Griffon. I have noted these dogs carefully at bench shows and know them from puppyhood up. The logical-minded 68 w7 SPECIAL FIELD DOGS 69 French claim that their sporting dog is the best all-around field dog in the world, since he is as good a pointer and bird-finder as he is a retriever (and we all know how lots of the finding of grassed birds is often left to us by our crack pointers and setters), and his double coat makes him impervious to cold in swimming after ducks. It will probably take several generations of Amer- ican breeding to develop in the French dog the combined speed and nose required of a field trial winner, but the fancy in this country is in good hands, notably Mr. L. A. Thebaud. The Griffon is not a handsome dog, compared to either pointer or setter. His head is heavy and square-lined, his coat is wire-haired and grey with black spots, and in general he looks like a cross between the Airedale and a blue belton setter. His tail is . always docked for the same reason in looks that a terrier’s tail is docked. The wire-haired coat is, like that of the Airedale, double, with a vest of fe downy hair underneath, making the dog able to plunge into icy water after ducks like a - Chesapeake, and enabling him to withstand the rough going in briers and wet underbrush that would soon put either setter or pointer to shiv- ering and flinching. Mr. Thebaud, who spent much of his time in France hunting with the 70 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG French-American painter, Rosseau, became much impressed with the possibilities of the Griffon as the dog in our country to solve the problem of a good all-around dog on both upland game and wild fowl. There is no question that the Griffon both points and retrieves under unusual condi- tions, both of which the Chesapeake cannot do, and for an all-around sportsman who can afford but one dog the Griffon should claim very serious consideration. The family began in our country with Kob de Merlimont, imported by Mr. Thebaud, to whom were later added Homere and Fileuse de Merli- mont, parents of the 1916 entry, Homere’s Jack. Of the German strain of Griffons we have Bolero von Gimbsheim, Korthals and Passe-Partout. There are but few Griffons advertised for sale. Mr. G. Van Morgan, of Denton, N. C., maintains a kennel of Griffons, and Mr. Thebaud, of Morris- town, N. J., will occasionally part with a dog to one who is sincerely interested in advancing the name and fame of the Griffon in America. Dr. Ilyus, of Lancaster, Pa., not only has Grif- fon puppies for sale, but offers two good ones at stud, Flambeau Planig (Le Capitaine Fracasse ex Anna Planig), a German Griffon, and Bolero von SPECIAL FIELD DOGS 71 Gimbsheim, noted above, by Ch. Rabot ex Diana von Gimbsheim. When it comes to an out-and-out retriever our own Chesapeake Bay dog is one of the best. This fancy is already well established, and good pups are to be had at reasonable prices. For the duck hunter, pointing and bird-finding ability are not the requisites for his furry hunting companion. Rather, he wants a big strong dog, able to swim in rough seaways in both salt and fresh water, double-coated so as to be coldproof in duck weather, and of perseverance and hardihood suf- ficient to sustain a long chase after a crippled duck. These the Chesapeake has to perfection. He lies in the blind quietly, makes no sound while the ducks are coming in, and when the guns are through his part begins, which is to jump into the icy water, swim out and catch any cripple and afterward bring in the slain. Owing to the ease with which ducks note the smallest black object, the ideal coat for the Chesapeake is a sedge brown. There is no need here to go into the various stories concerning the ancestry of the Chesa- peake; suffice it that the breed has been well es- tablished for some forty years, and was in its zen- ith during the great days of the ducks on the 72 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG Chesapeake, now gone forever. Among present- day sires the get of Beaver III appear both in the stud and puppy pedigrees offered on the dog mart. Clark’s Sea Wolf and Clark’s Sea Tramp are typical Chesapeakes, both by Beaver’s Rex out of Edmund’s Lusitania and Finey’s Pride, re- spectively. Other good puppies offered are by Water King ex Bessie H. Mr. Pulitzer’s Brownie was the star bench show Chesapeake of 1916. Going further back into the Chesapeake hier- archy, we soon get to Ch. Chester (Brownie- Pride), the finest of the breed. Chester Mat- thews, a present-day dog, is Hale’s Dick—Juda, in the direct Chester line, while Furlike, another good one, is Ferg’s Bingo ex Juda of the Chester- Mollie Evans strain. A typical three-generation Chesapeake pedigree would be as follows: ee “tastenia {Dolly J. THREE GENERATIONS OF CHESAPEAKE LINEAGE which should give the reader a fair idea of the family lines. It is quite as essential to get a pure- bred Chesapeake as a pure-bred setter or pointer, for crosses and mongrels never can specialise like thoroughbreds. Nerve and stamina are what are wanted in your Chesapeake, a dog that will crash through thin ice, cutting his own channel after a SPECIAL FIELD DOGS 73 duck, and have grit enough to do it again and again. Here’s where the yellow streak will show - out, if a mongrel. That, and looks. For the thoroughbred is a good-looking dog, whatever rags-and-tatters cross-breds may masquerade un- der the name Chesapeake. The great rival of the Chesapeake is the Irish water spaniel. An odd-looking dog, but every one who has ever owned one swears by him as the greatest ever. Mr. Percy Swan, of Chico, Cal., has lately imported a number of good ones and Dr. H. E. Rodley, of the same place, has a fine lot. His Ch. Hooker Oak Hogan is a typical dog of the breed. Hooker Oak Harp, Imp. Florrie McCarthy and Lady McShane will be names frequently met with in American strain Irish water spaniel fam- ilies. The best colour is a reddish brown almost as sedgy as Chesapeakes. The Rev. T. Moore Smith is one of the best known breeders of the fancy in the east. As to some of the wonderful feats of endurance and staying qualities in icy water and freezing duck weather that these dogs accomplish as part of their day’s work the Cali- fornia duck hunters are only too eager to testify. I have read many an enthusiastic letter from own- ers of the breed who hunted their dogs day after day in such conditions. 74 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG While the English Retriever has but small vogue in our country, there being but one entry in the big 5-point Westminster show, any breed that has some special virtue will always find adherents among our sportsmen. The Retriever has been in the main supplanted by our own Chesapeake, and the Irish Water Spaniel, but there is another dog, called, Down Hast, the Tolling Dog, which hails from Newfoundland and seems destined to have a future with us. His admirers have written me at length concerning the virtues of the breed. I shall content myself here with a brief statement of the particular claims of the breed on the atten- tions of American sportsmen. Suppose you had a dog that bred true to type, was an unexcelled cold-water retriever and would ‘‘toll’’ ducks for you. Sounds interesting, but just what is ‘‘toll- ing’’ ducks! Well, Down East they have solved that vexatious problem of a raft of ducks playing out in front of your blind (but most warily keep- ing well out of gun range), by using a tolling dog. This dog is trained to perform antics in the sedge; now in sight, now down in the grass, appearing and disappearing, until the curious ducks begin to swim in, little by little, to satisfy themselves what it is all about. They seem to have no fear of the toller which is a rather small dog, and soon are in SPECIAL FIELD DOGS 75 range, when the gunners up and at ’em, where- upon the toller swims out, retrieves the slain, and again begins his tactics when another flock settles out infront. By this means a good bag is secured under adverse circumstances familiar to us all, those aggravating days when the ducks will not trade but persist in rafting out in the bay consid- erably out of range. Such is the toller, seemingly a breed produced by crossing the English retriever on the well- known Labrador dog or Labrador retriever, a close relative of the Newfoundland. Mr. H. A. P. Smith of Nova Scotia is at present the principal breeder of these dogs. A final field dog is the much neglected spaniel. In England he takes the place of the setter here, for the average poor man’s dog. Easy to keep, affectionate, a good bird-finder, the spaniel is just the dog for the close English coverts, where you want the ground thoroughly worked up. I should say that he fills a good niche here, for the subur- banite sportsman’s dog. Suppose you want a house and watch dog that you can train to retrieve and that will naturally point grouse, woodcock and jack snipe when you get a day off and set out in the car to get a little shooting. A good, quiet, brainy cocker, working near you yet marking for 76 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG you just where Mr. Pat is hiding so you will not be looking somewhere else when he jumps, will do all for you that setter or pointer can do, and will be a much easier dog to keep. Again, suppose the hill country in your neighbourhood has many an oozy rill where the flight birds of the Canada woodcock pitch down and stick around awhile dur- ing the fall months. What better dog for an oc- casional day with them than a little cocker, which you can whistle up any time about the house and don’t have to keep in a kennel? Or, if you live down in the prairie and woods country of the cen- tral states and get a day in the marshes after jacksnipe or a day’s ducking, again the cocker is as good as any dog, and is a grand water retriever if the water is not too icy. Yes, sir; there’s a lot that that diminutive setter, the spaniel, can do for you, and most bird-dog laws and restrictions pass over his head, as in our country he is hardly classed by wardens as a hunting dog at all. This disqualification as a hunting dog is due to the bench-show evil, which operates to produce point winners rather than gun dogs. For the sportsman a line of the spaniels that are being worked afield is of more value than all the famous bench names in the world, so there is not much of value in going into spaniel history, as we have SPECIAL FIELD DOGS 17 with field trial setters and pointers. The Wat- nong spaniels, a kennel maintained by Mr. Wil- merding, of New York, is a good example of real field dogs kept so by continuous working. His Ch. Matterhorn, or the Watnong bitches, Floss, Irene and Nettie, give good hunting spaniel par- entage. The Canadian dogs, Ch. Black Duke, Black Knight, etc., and the dogs from the Weald- stone, Saybrook and Brookside kennels, are all field spaniels that have not forgotten how to hunt. For cockers, i.e., woodcock spaniels, the Midkiff, Lucknow and Bellevue kennels are reliable, but breed mostly for bench show points. On the borderland between the bird dogs and the fur dogs stands the Airedale, the dog who can hunt both. What shall I say of him—I who know and love him so well? My opinion of him remains about as it was when I penned ‘‘ Airedale, Setter and Hound’’—as just dog he is unbeatable, but as a specialist on either fur or feathers he is not to be compared to the breeds which were old in the hunting game centuries before the Airedale was ever thought of. He is the greatest of the ter- riers, and the one who can and is being success- fully trained to hunt everything alive that can be hunted. Tackling bear or cougar, routing out woodchucks, jumping rabbits, tree marking squir- 78 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG rels, pointing grouse and quail, running pheasants, and retrieving any and all of them—the Airedale properly trained has done all these things in hun- dreds and hundreds of individual instances. As staunch and dependable a friend as one can ever have, the Airedale is essentially a man’s dog —a manly dog, if I may put it that way. There is something essentially feminine about a setter, with his endearing ways and graceful form; and there is something essentially wild about a hound that we humans never quite get to the bottom of; but your Airedale you can know as man to man. You feel as if talking to another man, and a true and tried one, when you talk to him, and there is no small deed of courage and stout-heartedness that you may not attempt with him along as partner. While they breed pretty true to type, there is a good deal in the fortunate selection of the individ- ual Airedale. The bench shows are full of champs, who have been bred exclusively for points, with never a thought to the dog as a hunter, so that the name of the Airedale winner of the moment on your pup’s pedigree is no guarantee that he will develop into a good hunter. Some of the best of them possess brains, as well as points in sumptu- ous profusion and given a good brainy dog you SPECIAL FIELD DOGS 79 ean teach him the whole hunting game, for even the gun dogs proper do not inherit much more than a good nose and hunting instincts and also need special training. Wherefore your first care is that the Airedale sire and dam are notably smart dogs, preferably with a hunting education. There is no great hierarchy of dog families to guide one, as there is with the Llewellin setters, for every year sees several new imported champions which sweep all before them and start new Airedale families of their own. One year it will be Ch. York Ryburn Swell, the next show he may win reserve while Tintern Top Hole or Abbey King Nobbler takes first. Ch. Soudan Swiveller comes the nearest of them to being both a crack bench dog and a crack hunter. But there are a number of big kennels breeding extensively in hunting Airedale stock, and their kennel suffix goes along with the pup’s given name, and these aid one somewhat in placing the dog as a hunting possi- bility. Such names as the Oorang, Vibert, Cul- bertson, Ozone, Cedarview, Oaklawn, etc., kennels are a guarantee that your pup has many a hunting relative among his forebears and has a fair start anyhow. The rest is natural adaptability and training. If you don’t train your Airedale as thoroughly as you do your setter you cannot ex- 80 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG pect equal results. But any number of sportsmen have succeeded beyond all statements yet in print in the extent and variety of hunting accomplish- ments which they have taught their Airedale to master. The thing to do is to get out and hunt with him and let him learn by experience. Let him dig out his own woodchucks, ’possums, musk- rats; hole up his own skunks and squirrels; your part being to guide the hunting and get the dog where there is game to be had. He’ll soon learn. Take him along with the bird dogs, on a check cord if necessary, but let him be there and he wil! soon catch on. Airedales sometimes point birds with raised forefoot just lke a setter; my own dog Blaze usually raised the forefoot slightly, but his best cue was a trig eager attitude of fixed attention, standing motionless which generally meant a quail or grouse in sight. As to size, there is a great variety of opinion. Belmore Browne, the famous hunter, explorer- artist, raised a lot of Airedales in the Rockies and they always kept the smaller ones and disposed of the big stock. His reasons were that as a rule the smaller Airedale, around 45 pounds, was the brainier fighter. On the other hand some of the best lion and bear dog Airedales are picked around 60 pounds, and that by well-known handlers. Per- HSLUr SaaLias LUIVUd WO AaAso ', a NAMOINDO Cae Biles ptm m -- fr ¥ ue . © hw “ LTR EOE OOM COMPANY pants ath ( *. ee ew 4 «! (Courtesy Field & Stream) TWO AIREDALES WITH A BEAR AND A LION TO THEIR CREDIT MISTER DOOLEY—ONE OF THE BEST BRED IRISH WATER SPANIELS IN THE UNITED STATES GREYLOCK A FINE AMERICAN-BRED GRIFFON SPECIAL FIELD DOGS 81 sonally I would prefer the larger dog as tending more towards his hound than his terrier ancestry for we must not forget the otter hound of old England in our zeal to make a pure terrier of the Airedale. Of famous Airedales which have made good as hunters, we might mention the Culbertson dogs, Chs. Soudan Swiveller, Kootenai Firebrand, Koo- tenai Chinook, Lord Knobbler, the Oorang dogs, Clonmel Cadet, Reservoir Thunderbolt and a host of unknown others owned by admirers of the breed who have written me of the performances of their dogs. Again and again I hear from this and that sportsman who has trained his Airedale exclu- sively on grouse in Maine, pheasants in New York, quail in Michigan, chickens in the Dakotas, wood- cock in the Carolinas; and the performances of these specialists equal anything usually expected of a first-rate setter or pointer. It just shows what an Airedale can do with feathers; what he can do with fur is already well known. Occasionally one gets a chance to import a fine dog from England or decides to do so to improve his own stock. Regarding the method of proced- ure I quote the following letter from my good friend Wyndham Martyn, the well-known British sportsman: ‘‘I understand the increased rates 82 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG now obtaining in England have raised ordinary passenger fare about 50% and assume dogs would also be charged extra. Ordinarily the fare from Oxford to London (about 55 miles) is two shillings or under fifty cents. If your brother sailed from London he could take the dog in a taxi without extra charge. If from Liverpool the rate might be $1.50 or if from Southampton 60 cents, approxi- mately. ‘‘On board ship, a round rate of $2.50 was for- merly charged by the steamship people. “This may be altered. When once you have your dog on shipboard you are not allowed to keep him but must seek out the ship’s butcher who will look after him. As most of these men are sports- men in a mild way they get fond of their charges. The writer has never seen a dog of his looking any the worse for the trip except they may err on the high side by reason of little exercise and high liv- ing. For this care the butcher should get a couple of dollars. “‘As to the choice of bird dog in England, that depends entirely on the type of shooting. A pointer is sometimes called a ‘fortnight dog.’ By this is meant that he is most useful during the first two weeks of the partridge season (Sept. 1 SPECIAL FIELD DOGS 83 to 15). The big shoots in England during the partridge season take place mainly over roots, turnips, etc., and as there are so many birds a very fast dog is necessary. And for nose and pace no bird dog equals a good pointer. “Tf you are going to a mixed shoot where you walk up your birds and may have fur as well as feather (hare shooting opens on August the first) a setter is as good as any. As to what sort of setter depends mainly on the kind of farm you are shooting over. Irish setters are inclined to be wild and ‘break their fences’; while the Gordons do not fall into this sin, but work slowly and surely. The English setter is perhaps the best but there is very little in it. “Tf you are going on a ‘rough shoot’ where you must walk up your birds, rabbits and hares, a spaniel is pretty well the best utility dog. They are very easy to get in England and are in a vast majority in ordinary shooting parties. ‘“‘The spaniel is not a fast, wide-ranging dog, and for the reason that we cover bigger territories here than in England they are not much seen. Sussex, cockers or field spaniels all have their warm admirers and do good work in England ow- ing to restricted areas. Retrievers flat-coated 84 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG and curly are also used. In the event of your not knowing what sort of shooting you are going to have, we recommend a setter, especially one which has undergone successfully field trials.’’ CHAPTER V, PUPPIES To have or not to have—puppies—that is the question; and it besets many an owner and still more the prospective owner. The question has its pros and cons, as most questions have. When your bitch comes in season, shall you breed her, or shall you deny her nature’s supreme func- tion? If buying a pup from a kennel, shall you get a pup just weaned, or shall you spend more and get one in adolescence and more out of the reach of distemper? If you don’t breed the bitch she will have to be guarded with extreme vigilance and care; if you do breed her she will have to be guarded for several weeks after the mating to pre- vent further alliance with mongrel dogs. And, at the end of the period of gestation, in sixty-three days or less, you will have the manifold cares of being superintendent of a canine maternity hos- pital and foster-father of some six or more wee, furry packages of canine infancy. If you buy a young pup, just weaned, from the kennels, his cost 85 86 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG will be less than for an older dog, and you will enjoy many delicious moments in watching his infantile poses and antics, but your risk of losing him from distemper or some other ailment is much greater than with a dog a year old. It depends principally upon individual tempera- ment. Some men love children and pets and get hours of enjoyment out of caring for them and playing with them; others are more self-centred and are easily irritated by the doings of irrespon- sible pups and mischievous children. The former class, fortunately in the great majority, form the principal prop of the great institution of matri- mony, by which the world do move; the latter, con- stituting the bulk of the readers of smart and snappy magazines, are the main pillars of the sa- cred institution of alimony. To which class you personally belong should decide whether you should own a pup or pups, or should invest in a young grown dog. Puppies are a joy forever; they are also an intolerable nuisance. Like chil- dren, there is something infinitely tender and ap- pealing about them that tugs at the very heart strings of mankind; and, like children, they want the earth with a stone wall around it, they strew a path of ruin and disorder behind them, and they inevitably contract a variety of infantile diseases. PUPPIES 87 To me a two-months’ pup is a source of pure joy. His little, fat, waddly hind legs; his forever- wagging, busy deevilduyvil of a tail; his bright, inquisitive little face, with pricked-up ears and head cocked to one side; his hopeless innocence in this naughty and cruel world; his slashing bravery with which he tackles things that discretion would counsel him had better be left alone; his utter, appalling ignorance of the proper times and places to do whatever his fancy for the moment listeth—all these are a constant pleasure to me to watch. They do not irritate me; I laugh at his misdemeanours, condone his faults, revel in his virtues, and adore him from the end of his small black muzzle to the tip of his tiny tail! You miss a lot when you begin with a year-old pup; yet you avoid a lot, too. During those early months he will do at least a million things to ag- gravate you and make you lose your temper, and many a time you will shake your head and eall him a hopeless lemon. And then, being a thor- oughbred, he will be far less hardy than a mongrel pup and will take all his ailments badly, giving you many an anxious hour. But, if you bring him through, he will be your dog, ten times more so than if you started with him later in life. And, 88 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG if you lose him, it will go ten times as hard with you! Whether to keep bitch or dog also comes under the same heading of individual temperament. A bitch is more docile and affectionate; as smart as or smarter than the dog; is infinitely more trouble to keep because of her seasons, recurring every six months and lasting for about three weeks; and she is more hardy than the dog, following Na- ture’s universal law of making the more important sex of the species constitutionally sounder. The dog, on the other hand, is much easier to keep, is harder to teach, more quarrelsome with other dogs, more liable to disease, and, unless a prize- winner, is a source of no income to you as a pro- ducer. In general, I should not advise keeping a bitch for a man who has a family of growing children, already a great deal of care to their mother; she will be only one more thing to look after. But, for a city sportsman who can afford to have bis bitch kept at the country club, and looked after or bred properly when she comes in season, a bitch would be a very good and profitable choice. She will mind her strange master better afield, will stand railway journeys and exposure better, and will yield him a nice penny from the sale of her PUPPIES 89 puppies. For a man living in the country, with a big place and grown-up children, or at most but one or two youngsters, the bitch would be a very good choice. Such a man would have the leisure and inclination to breed her and raise high-class pups on the side, and an advertisement of any such litter in any one of the sporting magazines will easily clean out the whole lot, if good ones. Keep- ing the best pups for a future sire, and one or two of the bitch puppies for future matrons, he has the basis of a nice kennel—good, strong, line-bred stock. One more sire, bought later from outside stock, would save him from the evils of too much line breeding, and, by putting the puppies out to walk with farmers in the neighbourhood, after they get over eight months of age, he has his stock where it can flourish healthily and will be more im- mune from ravages of disease. Most farmers will board your pup very inexpensively ; some will take him for the protection to the farm that a dog of any kind always gives. Your first pup will naturally be bought from some kennel whose stock you fancy. Most ken- nelmen are reliable, and they have had the ad- vantage of having seen and noted the puppies when they were just born, which is the only time that any idea can be formed of their probable 909 THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG future behaviour, for after the first few days they all become so many little fluffy balls of fat and cannot be judged as to bonal structure. However, when just born, a very fair idea of the future conformation of head and body can be formed. Later, at about two months, you can judge of the most important anatomical feature of the pup, his couplings or backbone vertebre join- ing the last ribs to the pelvis bones which support the hind legs. These vertebra, if you will study the skeleton of a perfect dog, have long, strong side-lugs, or ‘‘processes,’’ as the professors call them, to which the strong muscles of the loin are secured. If this back structure is not broad and strong the pup will never amount to much. Thin and weak there, he is like a ship with a weak keel, hopelessly unseaworthy. Leave the selection of these points to the kennelman if at a great dis- tance; if anywhere within even five dollars’ car- fare, better go and pick out your pup with his help. For Airedales, spaniels, beagles and some hounds, the Eastern man will find suitable kennels within carfare range. For pointers and setters, the Middle West seems to be headquarters, and the pup must be bought on pedigree and your kennel- man’s selection. Most of them are entirely will- ing to ship you a pup on approval, so your whole THE AMERICAN HUNTING DOG 91 risk is the express fare, which amounts to about $3. 4 _ ' = ‘ - = & 7 4) ‘ ~ Gas ry | ; ie 4 sees 7, : ae, | J PLEASE DO NOT REMOVE CARDS OR SLIPS FROM THIS POCKET ee UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO LIBRARY ee ee ° Med oN see wee few ihn its pg ioerty od Or tae ITIL , y pales este ee ay JP ie sest aint a tt at Uebeabe cer eree OA em Ab yAISS iat + ¢ - 5 he oy et Sy) ssepes: Hel ny Regret oO PAS At a seabiaNs ee ie aes ais ae SEH? ie st + , ¢ i? A SEAT Ne att