al
consent, "Toho" is the word employed to tell a dog to point, the old rule
is clearly a judicious one, never to call him "Ponto," "Sancho," or by any
name ending in "o." Always, too, choose one that can be hallooed in a
sharp, loud, high key. You will find the advantage of this whenever you
lose your dog, and happen not to have a whistle. Observe, also, if you
have several dogs, to let their names be dissimilar in sound.

123. I have suggested your employing the word "Drop" instead of the usual
word "Down," because it is less likely to be uttered by any one on whom
the dog might jump or fawn; for, on principle, I strongly object to any
order being given which is not strictly enforced. It begets in a dog, as
much as in the nobler animal who walks on two legs, habits of inattention
to words of command, and ultimately makes greater severity necessary. If I
felt certain I should never wish to part with a dog I was instructing, I
should carry this principle so far as to frame a novel vocabulary, and
never use any word I thought he would be likely to hear from others. By
the bye, whenever you purchase a dog, it would be advisable to ascertain
what words of command and what signals he has been accustomed to.

FOOTNOTES:

[20] I once had a pointer pup whose dam was broken in (after a fashion)
and regularly shot to when seven months old. Without injury to her
constitution, she could not have been hunted for more than an hour or two
at a time. She ought not to have been taken to the field for _regular_ use
until fully a year old.

CHAPTER VI.

FIRST LESSON IN AUTUMN COMMENCED. RANGING.

124. A keeper nearly always breaks in his young dogs to "set," if their
ages permit it, on favorable days in Spring, when the partridges have
paired.[21] He gets plenty of points, and the birds lie well. But I cannot
believe it is the best way to attain great excellence, though the plan has
many followers: it does not cultivate the intelligence of his pupils, nor
enlarge their ideas by making them sensible of the object for which such
pains are taken in hunting them. Moreover, their natural ardor--a feeling
that it should be his aim rather to increase than weaken--is more or less
damped by having often to stand at game before they can be rewarded for
their exertions by having it killed to them,--it prevents, rather than
imparts, the zeal and perseverance for which Irish dogs are so remarkable.
Particularly ought a breaker, whose pu