than a city pigeon.  Birding over good dogs is the very poetry of field-sports.  The silken-haired setter and the lithe pointer are as far the superiors of the half-savage hound as the Coldstream Guards are of the Comanches.  The hound has no affection and but little intelligence, and the qualities which make him valuable are purely those of instinct.  The long, hungry cry with which he follows the deer and the sharp, angry yelp which he utters when chasing the fox tell plainly that the motives which prompt him thus to use his delicate nose and unwearying powers of endurance are precisely those which carry the Indian to the hunt or on the war-path.  He hunts for any master who will cheer him on, has no tactics but to stick to the trail and give tongue as long as the scent will lie, and must be whipped off the game when caught to prevent his devouring it on the spot.  The setter, on the other hand, is intelligent, affectionate and faithful.  If properly trained and reared, he loves his master and will hunt for no one else, learns to understand human language to an astonishing degree and exhibits reasoning powers of no mean order.  He hunts purely for sport, understands the habits of his game, and regulates his tactics accordingly, and delivers the birds uninjured to his master, sometimes controlling his appetite and carrying the game long distances for this purpose.  I have frequently discovered that my dogs, brought up in the house, understood words which had never been taught them.  My old favorite Di always answers the dinner-bell and stands near my chair for odd scraps.  Being somewhat annoyed one day by her eagerness, I said playfully, “Go to the kitchen and tell Annie to feed you.”  She at once rushed off and scratched the kitchen door until the girl opened it, and then stood by the tray of scraps looking at her and wagging her tail.  Wanting one of my little sons one evening, I said, “Di, go find the boys!” She rushed off, looking and smelling about their usual haunts, but returned unsuccessful.  I scolded and sent her a second and third time, with the same result:  a few minutes after she came quietly behind me with the hat of my youngest boy in her mouth:  she had taken it from a table in the passage, and her wagging tail said plainly, “Will this answer?  It’s the best I can do.”  The same dog will creep carefully upon partridges, and stand as if cut in marble lest they should fly, but will chase turkeys at full speed, giving tongue like a hound, and then lie still for hours while they are called up and shot, nor will she ever confound the different habits of the two birds or the different methods of hunting them.