In his beautiful monograph of the pointer, Mr. W. Arkwright, of Sutton Scarsdale, has given to us material and research which settles many things, and enables us to make up our minds with sufficient certainty for our own satisfaction upon many more. That is to say, any of us who take the trouble to refer to Mr. Arkwright’s pages will be able to form a judgment for ourselves upon the origin of the breed, as well as upon the tendency of breeders, for the last century. The author does not propose to quote, as he would like to, from those pages. The pointer is only one small item in a general book on shooting, and this is what the author is bidden to write by his publisher. A great deal was known about the pointer before Mr. Arkwright took pen in hand, and the views about to be expressed are considered opinions after reading that author’s work, and passing in mental review the breed as it has been known for the last half-century. The author became possessed of his first pointer about 1860. It was a gift, and came originally from the kennels of the Lord Derby of that time. It was a coarse dog with a coarse stern, so that if Devonshire men introduced foxhound blood in the seventies they were not responsible for the coarse sterns, or not entirely. THE FAMOUS FIELD TRIAL WINNER SHAMROCK BELONGING TO MR. ARKWRIGHT MR. W. ARKWRIGHT’S SOLOMON’S SEAL AND SEALING WAX TRYING TO GET UP HIGHER TO FEEL THE SCENT LEADER DESPATCH LARGO The pointer undoubtedly came to this country both from France and Spain. The former was a light made and the latter a heavy dog. They were apparently not related, but both became the ancestors of the modern pointer. With all this chance of cross breeding, our grandfathers do not appear to have been satisfied, and were for ever trying other crosses to improve their breeds. Colonel Thornton had a remarkable dog by a foxhound, and other sportsmen had very celebrated droppers—that is, crosses between pointer and setter. It came to be the fashion to think that these crosses never perpetuated their own merit in the next generation, and they got a bad name in consequence. Had this not been the case, probably no pure bred setters or pointers would have been handed down to us, and perhaps there were none so handed on. It seems to the author that there must have been ancestral reasons of the most imperative kind for the differences as found in noted strains of pointers in the middle of the nineteenth century. My experience has shown that cross breeding does not of necessity imply equal degrees of cross blood in the offspring. It never implies half and half; and although it generally does mean cross breeding to some slight extent, that slight cross can be eradicated in future generations by selection. Of all means of selection by externals for blood, colour and coat are the most trustworthy. It is exceedingly strange that dogs of the same ancestry but of different colours can be bred together for twenty generations and never blend The writer would therefore divide pointers in his own mind into three great modern families, each of which has both the Spanish and French pointer as a base. These branches are:— 1. Those that have setter indications, including the majority of lemon-and-white ones, and those of the “ticked” varieties. 2. Those which resemble the greyhound in formation and in fineness of stern, and have a tendency to have feet like the greyhound. They are often whole-coloured like it too. 3. Those which seem to trace to the foxhound, by reason of their “cat” feet, thick coats, and coarse sterns. Whether the origins suggested are correct or not, there is a very great difference between breeds at present, and some internal qualities seem to be most often found with certain colours and formations. For instance, the “dish-face” characteristic of the setter is most often found in the lemon-and-white pointer. The “Roman” profile characteristic of the hound is most often found in the liver-and-white sort, and the very fine stern and hare feet, the stern often with a tendency to curl up, is found most often in the whole-coloured pointers. THE SPANISH POINTER JUNO, A FAWN-COLOURED POINTER BRED BY KING GEORGE IV. IT IS SUGGESTIVE OF THE GREYHOUND LIKE MANY MODERN WHOLE-COLOURED POINTERS Of all these races the greyhound type is the most perfectly formed in body. The dish-faced lemon-and-white kind appear to be the most affectionate (spaniel-like); and the hardest workers, with the hardest constitutions, the author believes to be the liver-and-white sort. The principal colours of the original French and Spanish pointers were probably black-and-white and liver-and-white, some of them having very little white, so that it is not suggested that the supposed crossing was alone responsible for the colour. The first time a tendency to “grey” was noticed by the author was in the “ticked” pointer Romp, run at a field trial about 1870 in Devonshire by Mr. Brackenbury. The pedigree of this bitch was, to say the least, defective, and the “belton” markings, as also the whole conformation of the animal, was suggestive of the setter. Romp’s Baby, a descendant of the above Romp and similar in markings, was also setter-like in build, in feet, and in work. The aforesaid Romp laid the foundation for the best race of pointers in America, but unfortunately most of the blood has been lost to this country. The profuse ticked markings are rarely seen, but when they do appear it is easy to trace the character of the Romp family. Amongst all the pointers and setters the writer has seen he would be puzzled to name the best, but he can say without the smallest hesitation that Romp’s Baby was by far the best small one. Sir Richard Garth’s Drake was the best pointer that ever contested a field trial, in the author’s judgment. He was a large dog of the liver-and-white variety described above, but with a little of the body formation of the whole-coloured variety, and a good deal of the dish-face of the lemon-and-white ones. The author remembers this dog’s maternal grandsire, Newton’s Ranger, a very big animal of great refinement, On the evidence, the author is inclined to suggest that these two wonderful animals owe their vigour and unique qualities to a not very remote cross of blood. We have it that Drake’s paternal grandsire was a Spanish pointer, and we have Romp’s appearance and colour to declare her no pure bred pointer. The next best performers of the period, but with a great gap between, were Mr. Lloyd Price’s Belle, bred by Lord Henry Bentinck, but without pedigree given, and Mr. Sam Price’s Bang. The author is not certain whether the general opinion is that Mr. Sam Price went to the foxhound, and that Bang owed his substance and character to the cross, but he was certainly different in type from those other Devonshire pointers, Sancho and Chang, that won on the show bench about the same period, and were entirely pointer-like. Without in any way insisting upon the origins of the different types and colours above described, there is no doubt that some difference of ancestry at a remote or recent period has been responsible for the characteristics. Consequently, for practical It is obvious that, in starting to keep pointers, a prospective breeder must settle on one or other of the three existing types, and it is necessary for such a beginner to know that he may cross them one with the other with great constitutional advantage, without much fear of blending type or blood, provided he selects for type and character by means of colour. For instance, he may cross a black pointer with a lemon-and-white or liver-and-white, and repeat this in every generation, and yet the puppies that come black will be of one type, and those that come lemon-and-white will be of the other. The cases of blending will be very rare indeed, and can easily be discarded. The late Joseph Lang, the gun-maker, had a breed of lemon-and-white pointers, from which those of the late Mr. Whitehouse were descended, and that gentleman’s Priam and Mr. W. Arkwright’s Shamrock, with a space of thirty-five years between them, might have been litter brothers for appearance and work. The latter is the best lemon-and-white pointer seen out in quite recent years, and the former was probably the best of his period. Sir Watkin Williams Wynn has a strain of lemon-and-white pointers in which black-and-white and liver-and-white often come, and in this kennel there is a nearer approach to a blend Mr. A. E. Butter, of Faskally, had a very fine kennel of liver-and-white pointers, mostly derived from a strain kept up in Shropshire and the neighbourhood. These dogs had all the best strains of liver-and-white blood in their pedigrees, and they were as successful at field trials as, and much resembled, Mr. Sam Price’s Bang and Mike. Faskally Bragg and Syke of Bromfield were most striking workers, entirely of the liver-and-white type; but good as they were in the field, it was difficult to see how Bragg became a show Champion, with a very heavy shoulder, great throat like a hound, and the same suggestion behind. But he became a capital stud dog, and in Melksham Bragg probably became the sire of his own superior in work as well as in appearance. But a better than either was Syke of Bromfield. The best of this type is now in the kennel of Colonel C. J. Cotes of Pitchford, whose Pitchford Ranger and Pitchford Duke are in every way admirable specimens of this type of pointer. The latter’s dam, Pitchford Druce, approaches the dish-faced, fine-sterned type, and very few better have won at field trials in recent years. Colonel Cotes tells the author that this bitch traces back to his father’s old breed, kept for a century at Woodcote, where there were constant interchanges of blood with Sir Thomas Boughey’s sort, only recently dispersed. Mr. Elias Bishop has been very successful with his family of pointers called the Pedros, and these again are of the liver-and-white type, but with a tendency to the dish-faces of the lemon-and-white dogs, and not as coarse in the sterns as some of the more pronounced liver-and-white type. AN EARLY NINETEENTH CENTURY PICTURE OF THE WOODCOTE POINTERS, THE PROPERTY OF COL. C. J. COTES. HIS FIELD TRIAL WINNERS PITCHFORD DRUCE AND PITCHFORD DUKE ARE DESCENDED FROM HIS FATHER’S WOODCOTE POINTERS COL. C. J. COTE’S CHAMPION FIELD TRIAL PITCHFORD RANGER ON LORD HOME’S LANARK MOORS COL. C. J. COTE’S CHAMPION FIELD TRIAL PITCHFORD RANGER ON THE RUABON HILLS Mr. Pilkington at one time had as good liver-and-white pointers as anyone who was then running dogs in public. His Garnet was very much of a pointer; and Nicholson, who engineered him to victory, has continued to win at field trials with some of the breed; and another Salopian keeper who has been a most successful breeder is Mawson, who bred Faskally Bragg and Syke of Bromfield. As the sire of Mr. A. T. Williams’ Rose of Gerwn, the stud dog Lurgan Loyalty cannot be passed over. Rose was full of vitality and pointer instinct, but far from handsome, and very small. Lurgan himself was a small dog and very well made, but he had rather a terrier-like head. His daughter, Coronation, although long held to be the best pointer on the show bench, was obviously too shelly for hard work, and can only be mentioned here to show that exhibition points In these days of wild grouse and partridges, all the fine qualities and beauties of a pointer are absolutely useless unless the individual is endowed with the very best of olfactory powers. The length of a pointer’s “nose” is determined by the day; but the author is inclined to believe that the relative distances at which any two dogs can find game always bear the same proportions to each other. One on a fair scenting day may find game at 100 yards and another at 10 yards; another day, or in other circumstances, the same two noses will be effective at 50 yards and 5 yards respectively. Even this great difference does not convey all there is between the best and the worst. Such differences have been observed even at field trials, where each sportsman only enters his very best. But behind those is the rest of the kennel, and every breeder of dogs must occasionally breed the very bad indeed. The author has, at any rate, sometimes seen a dog with a total inability to find game although both its parents had exceptional olfactory powers. What the explanation may be cannot be suggested, but there may be a kinship between the organs of sight, hearing, and smell, and as there are some colours and sounds the human eye and ear cannot detect, and some scents that the human nose cannot recognise and the dog’s nose can, it seems possible that even a dog’s nose may occasionally be found either below or above the range of sensitiveness usual in the canine. But “nose” is the only quality in the dog that does not seem to be within the control of the skilled breeder, who may expect success within limits from proper selections of parental form, pace, stamina, and heart, but in inheritance of olfactory powers must expect the unexpected occasionally, but not often. FIELD TRIAL WINNER PITCHFORD BEAUTY ON THE RUABON HILLS FIELD TRIAL WINNER PITCHFORD BANG CAPTAIN STIRLING’S BRAG OF KEIR (FIELD TRIAL WINNER) COL. C. J. COTES’ FIELD WINNER PITCHFORD DUKE ON THE RUABON HILLS COL. C. J. COTES’ FIELD WINNER PITCHFORD DUKE ON LORD HOME’S MOORS IN LANARK This is not intended to be an excuse for slow dogs, for it usually happens that the very fast ones are also the best for nose; but it is meant to imply that a dog should not be exerting his whole energy in galloping, because if he is he will not be thinking about game-finding, and will not find. A pointer must do the thing easily, and go well within his powers. He must not couple and uncouple like a greyhound. He must not gallop like a little race-horse, although he may, if he can, gallop like one of those smashers that are said to “win in a canter,” which means that they are not exerting themselves. Pointers with lively stern action may be taken always to be hunting well within their powers. Some of those that have no stern action would have it if they were not over-exerting themselves in galloping, but this is not invariable; and some of the fastest and best pointers have not had stern action. For instance, Drake had not. About 1872, Mr. Thomas Statter, of Stand Hall, near Manchester, had as good pointers as anyone and the best setters. His pointers were of Lord Derby’s liver-and-white strain, and Major, Manton, Rex, and Viscount were some of his best. Major appears at no time to have been under much control, but he was a dog of great natural capacity, and his blood told in future canine generations, whereas that of his better trained victors died out. The late Mr. A. P. Heywood Lonsdale had a fine strain of this kind of pointer blood, and at the moment of writing one of the best, if not the actual best pointer in America is descended from dogs exported direct from the Ightfield kennel, which is now particularly strong in setters, but has not many pointers. For the late Mr. Lonsdale, and afterwards for his son, Captain H. Heywood Lonsdale, the late W. Brailsford managed a fine kennel of dogs, as he had To start breeding pointers of the right sort is as easy as to continue breeding the wrong. There are dogs constantly going to auction whose ancestors have won field trials for ten to thirteen generations. This is a guarantee to a certain extent that puppies will be worth something to shoot over. It is a great assistance to the breeder, who, having the blood, can confine his powers of selection to the choice for external form, which is a great simplification. A pedigree as long as one’s arm is absolutely useless as a mere record of names, but with field trial victors in every generation it is nearly all the help that a breeder can desire. If to these were added good photographs of each generation, it would make breeding almost a certainty. The records of bench show wins by no means take the place of photographs, for the variation of victorious types is as great as that of the selection of judges. This was always so, but of late years dogs have been bred for show without regard to their business in life; so that many exhibition pointers are only nominally of that breed, and instead of shows assisting pointer breeders they are so managed as to preclude competition by field trial dogs. This might be altered by the adoption by the Stud Book, or a new one, of the principles upon which the Foxhound Stud Book is managed by the Masters of Foxhounds Association. That is, by only admitting hounds bred from sire and dam entered in a recognised pack. The same principle would be satisfactorily adopted if only dogs bred from field trial winning parents, or winners themselves, were admitted to the Stud Book, or to pointer classes at shows, when Formation, which indicates power to work, is of as much importance in a well-bred dog as pedigree, which should indicate will to work. But in a badly bred dog formation is of no importance, but, by the Kennel Club management of dog shows and Stud Book, formation is treated as of the first importance, and true working blood as of no importance whatever. The author ventures to predict an alteration, or, failing that, a time when all the owners of sporting dogs of all kinds will ignore the Kennel Club as completely as the Masters of Hounds Association and the Governing Body of Coursing always have. Mr. B. J. Warwick, who has Compton Pride, a liver-and-white pointer with the distinction of winning the Champion Field Trial Stake at Shrewsbury twice, is a member of the Kennel Club, and Mr. Sidney Turner, its Chairman, has proposed at meeting only to give championship Kennel Club certificates to field trial winners; but the sporting influence is weak in the Club, and nothing has come of the Chairman’s proposition, which by itself would not go half far enough to redeem the sporting character of the Kennel Club, or to put under ground all show dogs that are nominally sporting but cannot work. Nothing less drastic will be of the smallest use in improving the shows for the true working breeds. The author is speaking only of pointers and setters here, of which breeds large numbers could qualify. The same treatment for spaniels and retrievers would naturally be deferred until field trials for those breeds had produced more winners and more dogs bred from winners in the field. The following contrast will assist in showing the care necessary in the choice of blood; for no breed differs more between its individuals than the pointers. About 1865 the writer had a small black-and-white dog of |