Gun Dogs

PREFACE

IN spite of the multiplicity of works on the Dog, the author is not aware of any previous publication, exclusively devoted to those breeds, which may be considered as essentially connected with devotees of the Gun, of which the Pointer, Setter, Retriever and Spaniel constitute an integral part—the Pointer and the Setter on the moors, and the Retriever and Spaniel in the covert and field. That the sphere of utility of the Pointer and Setter has diminished is an incontrovertible fact, the result of improved methods in raising and bringing birds over the gunners. That there are plenty of sportsmen who still prefer to follow the old method of sport by finding and walking up to their birds with Pointers or Setters is equally true, and it is fortunate that there are such disciples, otherwise the Pointer and the Setter would not only undergo rapid degeneracy, but in course of time would probably become extinct. On the other hand, the Retriever has grown in popularity by leaps and bounds, and to a less extent the Spaniel continues to be a favourite, more especially the Clumber, the Cocker and the Water Spaniel, types of which will be duly considered.

A reaction has set in in favour of Gun dogs, more especially Spaniels, being bred upon lines in conformity with such construction of the animal as will enable it to perform the greatest amount of work with the least expenditure of energy, a feature which is now regarded as the essential of a thoroughly-broken Gun dog. There is a popular, but frequently erroneous, opinion that the show-bench dog is of little or no use for work. Since the establishment of Field Trials in various parts of the country there has been a tendency towards the elimination of show-bench qualities only, or perhaps it would be better to say that assimilation of working and exhibition qualities has been the outcome of the representative trials alluded to. It stands as an indisputable fact that a Gun dog, to be worthy of the appellation, must be thoroughly schooled in its work, and unless a certain degree of perfection has been attained it will be of very little use to a sportsman. The advancement of the Retriever, within comparatively recent years, has been in a measure largely due to the gamekeeper, whose facilities for training dogs are exceptional. It is satisfactory to note how very lucrative some keepers have found it to be to breed and rear, and subsequently break and train, Gun dogs of the highest class.

INTRODUCTION

WHEN the author consulted me concerning a contribution to form an introductory to his work on Gun Dogs, I felt almost inclined to politely refuse the request, knowing full well that what may be termed the preamble of a work is very often, by hasty critics, the only portion scanned, and the merits or otherwise judged accordingly.

However, in the true spirit of sportsmanship, I have endeavoured to fulfil the indications outlined for me with reservation and modesty, which, needless to remark, are essentials to all literary efforts, whether great or small.

"In wintry woods when leaves are dead,

And hedges beam with berries red,

The Pheasant is my spoil;

Fenc’d with high gaiters, out I go,

And beat through tangled bushes low;

Each joy of mine my Spaniels know,

Though wandering many a mile.

At night returned, my bag well fill’d,

Perchance four brace of Pheasants kill’d,

I sit me down in peace."

Old Song.

Morris describes the fox as the spoilt darling of the nineteenth century. With equal truth we may say the Pheasant is the spoilt darling of the twentieth. As a preface to these few words on Pheasants, some lines from an old shooting song are quoted, from which will be seen the contentment of the old knight of the gun after killing four brace of Pheasants over the dogs. Since those lines—at some of the Northern Sporting Gatherings—were written, the Pheasant has passed through an evolution, and as much pains are expended in procuring a suitable bird for each part of the country as in discovering the best horse to carry the same sportsman to hounds. Equal, if not more, care is expended in rearing the Pheasant as the most valuable blood stock, and the whole system of breeding and rearing has been reduced to a science. The old-world sportsman, who lives in retrospect, regrets this, and cavils at an artificiality in sport. Evolution has made artificiality necessary, but when the critic likens shooting of hand-reared pheasants to the shooting of farm-yard fowls or tame pigeons, his opinions are not worth listening to. This is not the place to discuss the question of the merits of the old form of Pheasant-shooting and that which grows increasingly popular to-day. One cannot deny that the best sportsman is the one who is willing to pay the highest price for his pleasure, so far as difficulties, expenditure of energy and the courting of risks goes. These indeed are a sine qua non of all sports, for, as Lindsay Gordon writes:

"No game is ever worth a rap,

For a rational man to play,

  Into which no danger or mishap

Can possibly find its way."

Luxury and fashion are two words which, in the common acceptance of the two terms, are incongruous when used in connection with sport. It is because this is the case that one admires the old time Nimrod and regrets that some of his enthusiasm has gone from his descendants of to-day. "Autres temps, autres mœurs," however, is as true in sport, and in that which concerns us in this chapter, as it is regarding chivalry, sartorialism, and manners and customs at the table. In the days of our greatgrandfathers travel was a matter of difficulty and time. The country squires lived at home on their own estates, and their amusements and interests were necessarily confined to a very limited area. They were not great readers, their post-bags were infrequent and light; beyond the Sessions they had few public engagements, and so, being almost to a man children of the open air, they had to rely upon their own acres to provide them with sport. They invariably kept their own packs of hounds, and hunted the fox, the hare and the otter, and spent a considerable amount of time shooting over the dogs. Their estates were made to pan out the sport for twelve months every year, for beyond that of his neighbours, invitations to shoot were few and far between, because of the fact that all his contemporaries were similarly situated to himself, and little in the way of organised shooting was then done. Thus it will be seen that the stock of Pheasants every year was kept pretty well down, and four brace, killed over the dogs, would be quite a satisfactory morning’s work. But times changed; the stage-coach gave way to the railway (which, at the outset, was feared to be the death-knell of Agriculture and Sport), and gradually shooting-parties became more and more popular.

This evolution quickly brought in its train sidelights connected with it which have resulted in the status of the Pheasant being materially increased, in Pheasant-shooting ranking high in the affection of the English gentleman, and of the breeding and rearing of Pheasants becoming the science it now is.

As time went on the Squire found that invitations to shoot increased and he must consolidate his sport in a few days and reciprocate the days given him by his friends, and have such organisation and such a head of game to show worthy of the occasion. This was the real beginning of the systematic rearing and evolved Pheasant-shooting.

It must not be imagined that the army of beaters and the battue of to-day is entirely an innovation dating from this epoch, for a Yorkshire writer, Harry Harewood, in 1830, speaking of sport still earlier, said:

"Batten shooting has been much in vogue since this bird became so plentiful; but this I consider a style of shooting unworthy of a sportsman’s attention, and fit only for exquisites, to whose languid frames a day’s toil would be death. In this murderous work a few dogs are necessary; merely a springer or two, sometimes none, their duty being performed by two or three beaters, so that it can hardly be called sport, since the presence of that affectionate and sagacious creature the dog (which certainly forms a great attraction) is not wanted."

The fact that only two or three beaters were employed will give some idea as to the small character of the drives at this period, and we know, from records of many of the most sporting estates, that the number of Pheasants annually killed at this period was infinitesimal compared with the bags of to-day.

To the reasons already given for the increased popularity of the Pheasant, and the fact that so many thousands are now reared every year, must be added the competition between estate owners to vie with one another. The Field referred to this at the commencement of last season (1910) and deprecated this competition:

As to huge bags, and attempts to break a neighbour’s records, that is a passing vulgarity which has nothing of sportsmanship in it, and of which we shall hear less, we hope, every year, as we hear less already.

To revert to Harewood’s caustic remarks, I would quote the opinions of another Yorkshire sportsman who has played the game all round—Col. R. F. Meysey Thompson. He says:

Of course, ‘driving’ birds requires infinitely more skill for the actual shot, but, apart from that, there is nothing else demanded from the shooter. The arrangement of the day has to be thought out, but the carrying of it out is done by others—the drivers—and whether one bird or a hundred is put up it makes no difference to them after they have once started.

It has already been said that Pheasant-rearing is a science. There is no doubt of it. Almost every estate where shooting is held in esteem now has several hundreds, or some thousands, of Pheasants reared on it every year, and, according to the possession or lack of knowledge, and use of that knowledge, is the head of game to hand when sport begins. More than this, the choice of ground, the manner of place in which the birds are fed, the encouragement they receive to remain here or there, influences the character of the sport not a little. The choice of eggs, the collecting of those from nests wide of the coverts, the procuring of foster-mothers, the employment of the large incubator, are all matter for serious consideration, and happy is the estate owner, or lessee of a shoot, who has thoughtful men who use their heads and allow experience to teach them, rather than ever conforming to certain rules and practices they learned in their youth. No hard-and-fast lines can be laid down regarding the rearing and feeding of Pheasants, for local circumstances and idiosyncrasies must always influence this very important preface to every shooting season.

When the birds begin to hatch, the keeper and his assistants have not a minute to call their own, for then, and as time goes on, the work of weeks may be undone in a few minutes. As a rule, rearing takes place at two or three different points on each estate, the greater number being at the head keeper’s cottage, if it is conveniently situated for this purpose. So soon as the birds have been hatched in the incubator, or by the foster-mother (if her eggs are chipping slowly), they are placed in the warm drying compartment of the incubator, and as each hen comes off she has a number given her, the total of the clutch being chalked on her coop. The paddocks around the cottage are dotted with these coops, and as one by one they become tenanted, and hundreds of tiny Pheasants answer to the cluck! cluck! of the farm-yard hen, the keeper’s responsibilities increase. Many are the happy hours the writer has spent in the rearing-grounds, gun in hand, awaiting a chance shot at a hawk, carrion crow, or the other pests which hover around and, despite incessant watching, occasionally manage to swoop down and carry off a bird.

Covert has to be provided for the Pheasants, the coops have to be moved from time to time, the cleanliness and health of the foster-mother seen to, the food regulated to the state of the ground and weather, and as the birds grow in age and the coops are moved into the woodlands added precautions have to be taken against Mr Fox.

After they have begun to roost in trees, and the foster-mother’s call is unheeded, and after she has been dispensed with, the stink trail is still here and there run in the woods, lamps left burning and a hunting-horn occasionally blown, so that the fox will give that part of the covert, at any rate, a wide berth. So day in and day out for weeks does this watching and feeding continue. The old saying has it, Up goes a guinea, bang goes a penny, and down comes two-and-six. This has reference to the expense of rearing birds. It is, however, much exaggerated. Of course the expense can be made enormous, and counting everything—pheasant, food, eggs, wages of keepers, beaters, lunches, and the rent, if it is a leased shoot—each bird does represent a considerable outlay. Next in order to hunting, racing and polo, it is probable that the shooting of reared Pheasants causes the most money to circulate, and this expenditure increases year by year as Pheasant-shooting grows in popularity. I have already said that there is no real unanimity as to the best Pheasant for shooting, so much depending upon locality.

Since the existence of the Pheasant depends so much upon the sport he shows (to a lesser extent, certainly, than the fox) it is natural, perhaps, one should pause and inquire wherein lies the fascination of the bird, and the shooting of it. If one faces the question it will probably be found the attraction to Pheasant-shooting is made up in a variety of sidelights, each essential to the full enjoyment of the sport, and each having contributed to the increased status and numerical strength of the bird in England.

In An Encyclopœdia of Rural Sports, published in 1840 by Mr D. P. Blaine, there is a note regarding the weight of Pheasants, which runs as follows:

The Pheasant occasionally grows to a great size; Mr Daniel notices one in 1810, near Whitehaven, which weighed fifty-six ounces, and measured, from bill to tail, one yard five inches. Mr Missing of Titchfield, Hants, killed, on the estate of John Fleming, Esq. (M.P. for that county), 23rd November 1827, one which weighed three pounds five ounces and measured from one extremity to the other three feet ten inches.

Since this was written there has been considerable evolution in the breeding of Pheasants. The weights recorded by Mr Blaine were no doubt quite wonderful and worthy of note a century ago, but there is nothing very remarkable about them to-day. It may, however, be interesting to give the weights of three birds shot by Lord Hawke at Hambleton, Yorkshire, on 5th December 1909:

These birds were quite typical of those killed during the day, and were picked up in haste out of a row at the end of the shoot. Another brace, chosen equally at random by his lordship, were found to weigh over half a stone. These Pheasants were a cross between the old Black Neck and the Mongolian. One of the best authorities I know on the Pheasant, a man with endless experience of breeding, rearing and shooting Pheasants, replies to my query as to this cross in the following very decisive terms:

I have no doubt that the best cross is that between the Old Black Neck and the Mongolian. They are the most popular to-day, and in many ways the best. In the first place, they are stronger when hatched and are of good weight when full grown.

Let us take a typical day in covert; it will possibly form an index to the raison d’être of the Englishman’s affection for the bird and the sport he shows. The following is a description of the best day I had this season:

"One might have imagined a party of woodmen were engaged felling the mightiest of the trees, or else the elves of Pan, the god of the woodlands, were disporting themselves and keeping their festival. Not a sign of humanity was there beyond those standing in an open space in the very centre of a deep woodland ghyll, yet the whole ravine was alive with a tap! tap! tapping, which progressed with clocklike regularity and came nearèr and nearer. An owl flew by, wakened from its slumber in hollow-treed darkness, and another followed, to disappear again and blinkingly wonder the cause of the morning disturbance. A fox crept along the ride, stood for a second and branched off to the right to leave the wood. He knew it was not his regular tormentors, but felt safety lay in distance, though little need for great haste. All Nature was wakened by a rap! rap! rapping as it advanced, driving forward all things of the ground or air. That was the purpose of the army of rustics who would have told you, had you asked them, they were engaged for the day as ‘bee-aaters.’ Stationed in their appointed places were ‘the guns,’ awaiting the flight of wings to be driven over them. A woodcock was the first to come, but ere a gun could be raised to the shoulder it had darted back into the wood over the heads of the beaters. Then there was a beating of wings in the air as the Pheasants, who had come, stage by stage, down the valley, at last found themselves compelled to cross the open space. The beating of the beaters was soon drowned by the banging of the guns, and the rattle of the falling shot, which fell around one like rice at a pre-confetti wedding. The loaders had their work set to give and receive as the heap of used cartridges grew bigger and bigger and the bag around their necks became lighter. For eight or ten minutes the birds came in half-dozens and scores, some of them falling with a thud upon the ground, ere the smoke seemed to leave the barrel to pollute the air. The dogs were not a moment before they were after runners, which they laid at the feet of the keeper in whosè charge they were. When the beaters at last came in sight and shooting ceased, the game laid out in its painted row numbered some two hundred birds and a few rabbits. Far more heterogeneous was the line of beaters. One might have imagined them a mob of peasantry come to forcibly demand the rights of free warren, or some favour from the squire. There they stood, with the village schoolmaster and policeman at their head, each armed with a formidable stick, and each with his nether garments bound up to the knees with ‘leggums’ or string. There, amongst the weird collection of humanity, gazing at the guns with all the English rustic’s affection for, and worship of, a lord and blue blood, were the postman, fresh from his unusually hurried rounds; the local innkeeper, whose customers are all around him now in the woodlands as they will be later in the evening when they live the day again in retrospect; the village carpenter, who has left the unfinished coffin and the making of a gate till the evening; the butcher, who told the new vicar’s wife, in soliciting her custom, ‘he was a butcher by birth’; the local ‘Mowdy-Warp’ (mole) catcher is there, and amongst others those who, whilst notoriously not fond of work, will dig the whole day to get out a fox, to find a lost ferret, or secure a badger, and will take it as a pleasure to scramble through the thorny woodland undergrowth ‘to beat fer t’gentlemen.’ It may be hard work, but there is an element of excitement connected with it which jumps with their affection for all that love of the open air (whose children they are) which they possess. These all enjoy their day equally as much as the guns, who pay the piper hundreds for the tune. All sizes, all ages, and many of them whose physiognomy seemed to suggest they had no interest beyond a large turnip or a fat pig, there was a sameness in the very variety of the facial expressions of this group of humanity. Here they stood, at the end of the drive, civil and, to a certain extent, servile so long as treated with tact, but otherwise the most ‘independent’ of mortals, awaiting the next move. The guns discussed the drive over cigarettes, whose Turkish fumes added to the foreign odours which were impregnating the woodlands and hanging on every leaf. The beaters stood and took it all in, whilst the loaders and keepers were busy collecting game and getting ready for the next plan of campaign.

"The ghyll ran in the shape of the letter S, and we now walked over some fields to the top of the letter (having beaten the centre), so that the birds might be driven back again to the point at which the beaters started. As we crossed the top of the S the ploughman and turnip-puller all looked up with pleasure and interest, half afraid to acknowledge their friends and acquaintances amongst the army of beaters, who laid low the newly-made furrows with their huge boots (which must have carried almost half a stone of clay each) and for a time drove away the most impudent of the crows, whom the rustic avers can smell a gun a mile away. The horses attached to the plough were quite as interested as the man at their head, and the chances are they have never seen so many human beings at one time before; for it is of an isolated part of the North, high up the hills, of which I write. It was now a ‘walking shoot’ round the curve to the starting-point and not very productive of game, though some most sporting shots were offered and taken. This, after all, is the main desideratum. So on we walked, keenly anticipant, for a little over a mile, through sylvan bits of scenery, which know no sounds but those of the noisy pheasant, the screeching owl, or the yap! yap! of the fox in his season of amours, save when the man with the gun, or with the horn, comes to seek his respective quarry. Then the valley echoes and re-echoes; the rabbits scuttle, the pheasants fly, the smaller birds—looking all the smaller after seeing the scores of painted-breasted mongolians—flit unharmed away in wonderment at the intrusion. When we arrive in sight of the first stand everyone seemed to be carrying a brace of birds, and sixty were added to the number of the slain. The game-cart came up, drawn by a mournful horse, led by an equally mournful man, with a dust-coloured coat buttoned over his shoulders, and the sleeves, containing no arms, hanging loosely down, for all the world as though he were a veteran from the wars. He sucked a small clay pipe with slow and measured sucks, much as he would have done if he could have produced a Gregorian Requiem Tone from it. He was well pleased to carry off the fallen from the field, for never did a more funereal-looking man drive a hearse, let alone a game-cart. The birds’ legs were soon tied in pairs, and then hung on the poles m the cart and dispatched to the game larder, three or four miles away. ‘Be sharp back, Dave,’ said the head keeper, and Dave, after having fully grasped the import of the command, said, ‘I’ll be sharp,’ but started off in a manner which gave the lie to the assent, and leaving behind him a cloud of the strongest tobacco, which would cause every fox coming along that way to halt and make a slight deviation of his route for that night at least.

"It was now lunch-time and the most phlegmatic of the beaters seemed to allow his face to light up at the announcement and to awaken from the lethargy which at once seized the group on the cessation from their duties. There is no pain, no ailment, no symptoms so startle the rustic as his inability to eat, and one medical I know once ruined a village practice by telling his patients it was well for them to give their stomachs a rest sometimes. On this much-looked-for festival one might have imagined they had