The origin of the Setter is involved in hopeless mystery, and it would not be particularly interesting or of any great importance to endeavour to penetrate it by giving the various and irreconcilable opinions of many writers, both ancient and modern, who have given us their views on the subject. Suffice it to say that the general opinion that the Setter was the improved and selected offspring of the Springer Spaniel does not seem as probable as its converse.

There is no doubt but that the Setter was first used for hawking, and it seems far more probable that a pointing dog* rather than a flushing one, should have been acceptable for this purpose. Besides, the word Spaniel, or Spaynel, indicates Spain, as in an old book, said to be written by a son of Edward III. in 1402, it is stated : "The nature of him comes from Spain."

What appears most probable is that the Setter is the oldest of British dogs, that it was probably introduced by the Romans, and that, when in later times the Spaniel and Pointer were imported from Spain, crosses between these and the original English dog produced respectively the more modern Setter and the many different strains of Spaniels now so well known among us.

Between the old Springer and the modern Setter there is a strong family likeness, as may be seen by many plates of this dog published in old books. Setters and Pointers too were of course broken to the net long before guns were invented. Wood says: "The first person who broke a setting dog to the net was Dudley, Duke of Northumberland, in 1535"; and as late as 1818 we hear of pointing dogs being used for this purpose, and to the writer's certain knowledge they have been employed by poachers very much later than that. For this purpose the Setter appears to have been preferred to the Pointer on account of his natural crouching attitude.

Perhaps there are very few sportsmen or dog lovers of the present day who would not agree with the opinion that the Setter is the most beautiful in appearance, as well as the most affectionate in disposition, of any sporting dog. Whether the beauty of the breed, as well as its sterling sporting qualities, has been improved in the last hundred years is an exceedingly doubtful matter. The writer inclines to a medium opinion - viz. that a hundred years ago there were a great many more really handsome dogs than there are now, and also a great many more really useful and dependable for shooting purposes, but that there are a select few to be found at the present day vastly superior certainly in beauty, possibly in working qualities, to their ancestors. His own recollection of the ancient Setter, which goes back to the year 1853, is that he distinctly remembers at that time three, if not four, distinctly different-looking dogs.

There were a great number of Setters in those days, mostly lemon-and-whites, in the South and West of England - great upstanding dogs with fine shoulders and hindquarters and exuberant feather. These may be taken as the pure breed. Again, there was another sort shorter in the leg, with heads broader and more massive, and coats inclined to be curly; these had no doubt been crossed with the Irish Water Spaniel. There was a third sort, of which the writer has seen but very few specimens, a short, stout dog with a short, broad nose, and as slow as a man; this may be taken as a recent cross with the Spaniel.

The fourth sort was a small, fine-limbed, beautifully feathered, straight-coated dog, with a finely cut head, generally black-and-white. Mr. Hiles, the agent for Lady Bowden, in Herefordshire, had a strain of these. The writer bought one himself from him early in the fifties, and he was one of the best in the field he ever saw and as handsome as a picture.

Now, it is a common idea that there are a great many more Setters, and Pointers too, in these days than there were fifty years ago. The writer does not believe a word of it.

There are, we know, in the present day very large kennels of both breeds, chiefly kept for show and field-trial purposes; but these are, after all, few and far between, while now, alas! even on the Scotch moors dogs are rarely used, and for partridge shooting we may almost say never. In the old days every man who shot had one or two dogs - no one ever shot without them - and some had fairly large kennels. Not only that fast-declining race the old English gentleman had his Setters or Pointers or both, but every sporting farmer likewise.

The writer has a vivid remembrance of a Setter belonging to a man of this then most worthy class, and with whom as a boy he had many a good day's sport. The dog was a huge black-and-white, nearly as big as a Newfoundland, with a massive Pointer head and a curly coat. He was very slow but exceedingly sure, and if you gave him plenty of time, he would range every inch of a field and find everything in it. His master was a fine fellow of 6ft. 3in., big in proportion, and immensely powerful, he was celebrated far and wide in the country for his pugilistic proclivities, and was, moreover, a really wonderful shot.

One day, while out with this man and dog, the writer hit a bird hard which went on over a small hanging wood and then towered. On arriving as promptly as possible at the spot, we found it was a potato garden, in which the occupier was apparently hard at work.

"Did you see that bird fall?" said Mr. C __.

"No, sir; no bird fell here."

"Ah!" was the reply, with a knowing wink at me. "Here, then, we'll look for it." And beckoning his dog to the end of the little field to give him the wind, he gave him a cast straight across the potato digger.

The old dog threw his head up into the wind, walked a few yards, and then came to a dead point ten yards from the man.

Mr. C------ walked up calmly, took his coat off, folded it up, and laid it on the ground.

"Now, then," he said, "give me that bird out of your pocket, or I'll give you the------hiding you ever had in your life."

The man began, "I told ee------," and then, looking up and observing an ominous turning up of the shirt-sleeves, he took the bird out of his pocket and handed it over without a word.

"Whatever made you think of that? " the writer said afterwards.

"Why, because last week old Don did the same thing, only that time it was at my coat, with a brace of birds in it, that I had put down on the ground while I walked a bit of standing wheat in the hot sun."