Anecdotes of Dogs

by Edward Jesse

The natural food of the dog is flesh, and it is found that those in a wild state prefer it to every other kind of nutriment, but as raw meat engenders ferocity, it should not be given too freely, especially to house-dogs and such as are not actively exercised. The dog can subsist on many kinds of food, and it is a curious fact, that when fed entirely on flesh he will sometimes get lean; because, as has been well observed, it is not on what animals eat that they thrive, but on what they digest. The diet of sporting dogs in full work should, it is said by some, consist of at least two-thirds of flesh, with a judicious mixture of farinaceous vegetables; but there is great diversity of opinion on this subject, and in France they are fed almost exclusively on soaked bread. Dogs, it is generally said, should have free access to fresh water, and the pans be cleaned out daily; but some feeders, we are told, and it seems strange, limit the supply of water, and substitute moistened food. A piece of rock brimstone kept in the pan will be found useful.

Although the dog is naturally a voracious animal, he can endure hunger for a very great length of time, and be brought by habit to subsist on a very scanty meal. In the Memoirs of the Academy of Sciences it is stated, that a bitch which was forgotten in a country-house, where she had access to no other nourishment, lived forty days on the wool of an old mattress which she had torn to pieces and digested.

An extraordinary instance of a similar kind occurred with a terrier bitch, named Gipsy. One day, when following her master through a grass-park near Gilmerton, it happened that she started a hare. During the pursuit her master suddenly lost sight of her, and in a few days she was considered either killed or lost. Six weeks afterwards a person happening to look down an old coal-pit, was surprised to hear a dog howling. He lost no time in returning to the village, and having procured a hand-basket, let it down by a rope into the shaft; the dog immediately leapt into it, and on being brought to the surface, proved to be Gipsy, worn to perfect skin and bone. How she had existed in this subterranean abode, and what she had found to support her there, it is impossible to tell.

Stag-hounds, fox-hounds, harriers, and beagles, are generally fed on oatmeal,—some add well-boiled flesh to it once in two days,—and the older the meal is the better. Store sufficient for twelve or eighteen months' consumption ought, therefore, always to be kept by those who have a pack; and before used should be well dried, and broken into grits, but not too fine. It is best kept in bins in a granary, well trodden down. Some persons are in the habit of using barleymeal unprepared, but this is thought by many to be less nutritious. Others are of opinion that oatmeal and barleymeal in equal proportions form a preferable food. In either case the meal should be made into porridge, with the addition of a little milk, and occasionally the kitchen offal, such as remnants of butchers' meat, broth, and soups, the raspings and refuse of bakers' shops, or hard, coarse, sea-biscuit (sold as dog-biscuit), well soaked and boiled with bullocks' liver or horseflesh.

Well-boiled greens—or mangel-wurzel boiled to a jelly—are an excellent addition to the food of all dogs, and may be given twice a-week; but they ought to be discontinued during the shooting-season with pointers, setters, cockers, and greyhounds; and also during the hunting season with foxhounds, harriers, and beagles, as they are apt to render the bowels too open for hard work.

Flesh for dogs should be first thoroughly boiled and then taken out before the oatmeal is added to the broth, and left to cool. Indeed, some feeders think that the food of a dog should always be perfectly cold. At any rate, care must be taken not to serve it out "too hot," although, in general, dogs are sagacious enough not to scald themselves, as we see in Landseer's exquisite little picture on the opposite page.

Dogs which are hard worked are by some said to be the better for having two meals a-day—a very light one of mixed food in the morning before going out, and a full meal, principally of flesh, on their return in the evening; but, as a general rule, one good meal a day, towards the evening, is sufficient, and they may be left to pick up what they can: indeed the dealers never give more than one meal a-day. Bones to pick may be allowed them occasionally, but hard bones in excess are likely to wear and damage the teeth. Nothing is better than paunch, tripe, or good wholesome horse or cow-flesh, boiled, and the liquor mixed well with oatmeal porridge; the quantity of each about equal. If horse or cow-flesh is not to be had, graves, in moderate quantity and well scalded, are a tolerable, though not very desirable, substitute. They are generally broken small, mixed with about one-half the quantity of oatmeal, then thoroughly soaked in boiling water, and well stirred; or, a better way still is to boil them together like porridge.

Dogs, like men, require a change of food, and it has been strongly asserted that barleymeal and oatmeal, without change, predisposes to cutaneous disease, and even produces it; therefore, a judicious feeder, like a good cook, will contrive to vary his bill of fare. Porridge and milk, dog-biscuit, farinaceous food, the scraps of the kitchen, the offal of bullocks or sheep, which should be well boiled, make an excellent variety;—but we would by no means recommend too frequent a repetition of the latter food. Potatoes are also good, and although not so nutritious, or easy of digestion, as oatmeal, are less heating.

Care should be taken never to present more to a dog than he will eat with a good appetite; and when oatmeal and barleymeal are given mixed, the former should first be boiled for twenty minutes, and then the latter added, and boiled only for about eight or ten minutes. This meal should, however, never be given in the hunting season, as it is too heating, and occasions the dogs to be perpetually drinking. Their food ought, as a general rule, to be given to them pretty thick, as thin porridge does not stay the stomach so well. The feeding-troughs for hounds should be sufficiently wide at the bottom and carefully cleaned out and scalded with hot water every second day.

During the hunting season hounds should have sulphur mixed up with their mess once a-week, in the proportion of 3 drachms to each. At the end of the season the same quantity of sulphur should be given, with the addition of 1½ drachms of antimony. After a hard day's work a meal of horse-flesh may be given them, as fresh-killed as possible, or bullocks' paunches or sheeps' trotters, all of which should be well boiled.