The Complete English Wing Shot

by George Teasdale Teasdale-Buckell

LARGO
THREE OF MR. ARKWRIGHT’S WHOLE-COLOURED POINTERS—LEADER, DESPATCH, AND LARGO

Mr. William Arkwright holds that any foxhound blood is bad; it must therefore have tried him very highly when he discovered that all pointers are the descendants of hounds. Doubtless there is a difference between hounds, and possibly the foxhound is the last kind one would wish a pointer to resemble; but, after all, a hound’s business is to catch and kill, whatever sub-title he may claim, and consequently it follows that pointers were evolved from dogs whose business was to catch and kill. If, therefore, our dogs are sufficiently opposed in instincts to their ancestors, there can only be a sentimental objection to a perceptible external trace of hound. As a matter of fact, half the pointers seen at field trials have too much “point,” and not one in fifty too little. No doubt it was the tendency for the natural point to increase in every generation that caused the sportsmen of Colonel Thornton’s period (about 1800 a.d.) to cross with the foxhound.

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 colours in the offspring. This blending of colour happens but very rarely, and as colour is more or less indicative of blood, almost certainly for one, so it remains through many, generations. In discussing setters the author has had occasion to relate more fully his own experience of this remarkable tenacity of colour, in spite of colour crossing, and also to note the curious fact that along with colour is inherited much of the character that originally belonged to or accompanied it.

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.