In addition to speed, the dog must have strength to last out a severe course, nimbleness in turning, the capacity to catch and bear the hare in his stride, good killing powers, and vital force to give him dash, staunchness, and endurance. What a dog possessing these qualities should be like an endeavour will be made to show.

Without going deeply into the subject of coursing, it will be necessary to briefly glance at what a dog is required to do in a course, and that for two reasons : first, because practical writers are agreed that all dogs should be judged in the show-ring by their apparent suitability for their special work; and secondly, because this book may fall into the hands of many who are real lovers of the dog, and genuine sportsmen at heart, but who, from various circumstances, have never had an opportunity of seeing a course, or that so rarely as to be practically unacquainted with its merits.

The remarks of the inexperienced on a course are often amusing. The commonest mistake made by the tyro is, that the dog which kills the hare always wins, irrespective of other considerations - a most excusable error on the part of the novice, as in most or all other descriptions of racing the first at the post or object is the winner; but in coursing it is not the hound first there, but the one that has done most towards accomplishing the death of the hare, or put her to the greatest straits to escape, that is awarded the palm. Be it here understood that the object of the courser and the object of the dogs differ materially. The dogs' object is the death of the hare; the courser's object is to test the relative speed, working abilities, and endurance of the competitors, as shown in their endeavours to accomplish their object: and the possession of the hare is of little consequence, except to the pothunter or currant jelly devotee, who is quite out of the pale of genuine coursing society.

Two dogs only are slipped at a hare - and this has always been the honourable practice in this country. Even the Greek courser Arrian recognises this, saying: "Whoever courses with Greyhounds should neither slip them near the hare, nor more than a brace at a time"; and in Turberville's "Observations on Coursing" we find the maxim: "If the Greyhounds be but yonge or slow, you may course with a lease at one hare, but that is seldom seen, and a brase of dogges is ynow for such a poore beaste."

The hare being found, or so-ho'd, and given law - a fair start of eighty or a hundred yards - the dogs are slipped. In the run up, as in after stretches following a turn, the relative speed of the dogs is seen; but the hare, being pressed, will jerk, turn, and wind in the most nimble manner, testing the dog's smartness in working, suppleness, and agility in making quick turns, and "it is a gallant sport to see how the hare will turn and wind to save herself out of the dogge's mouth, so that, sometimes, when you think that your Greyhound doth, as it were, gape to take her, she will turn and cast them a good way behinde her, and so save herself by turning, wrenching, and winding." It is by the practice of these clever wiles and shifts that the hare endeavours to reach her covert, and, in closely following her scut, and o'ermastering her in her own devices, that a Greyhound displays the mastery of this branch of his business, in which particular a slower dog will often excel an opponent that has the foot of him in the stretches; but, with this working power, ' a facility in making short turns, speed must be combined, or it stands to reason points could not be made, except on a comparatively weak hare. It is, therefore, important that the conformation of the dog should be such as to combine speed with a strength and suppleness that will, as far as possible, enable him to control and guide the velocity with which he is moving, as his quick eye sees the game swerve or turn to one side or another.

As the death of the hare, when it is a kill of merit - that is, when accomplished by superior speed and cleverness, and not by the accident of the foremost dog turning the hare, as it were, into the killer's mouth - is a consideration in reckoning up the total of good points made, it is important that the dog should be formed to do this, picking up and bearing the hare in his stride, and not stopping to worry her as a Terrier would a rat. And here many points come in which should be narrowly scanned and compared in the show-ring, but too often are not, and these will be alluded to hereafter.

In addition, there are other requirements for which the dog must possess qualities to make him successful in the field, and give him a right to a prize in the show-ring; these will be noticed in detail.

In forming an opinion of a dog - whether in selecting him for some special purpose of work, or merely choosing the best out of a lot in the prize ring - first impressions are occasionally deceptive, get confirmed into prejudices, and mislead the judgment. But, in the great majority of cases, to the man who knows what he is looking at, what he is looking for, and what he has a reasonable right to expect, the first impression conveyed to the mind by the general outline or contour, and the way it is filled in, will be confirmed on a close critical and analytical examination of the animal point by point; and it is only by such close and minute examination that a judge can become thoroughly master of his subject, and arrive at a position where he can give strong, clear, and intelligible reasons for the opinions he has formed and the decision he has arrived at. Moreover, there is that to be weighed and taken into account, in the final judgment on the dog's merits, which is referable to no part alone, and which can only be appreciated on taking him as a whole - that is, life - that indefinable something which evades the dissector's knife, yet permeates the whole body; the centre power, which is the source of movement in every quivering muscle, and is variously seen in every action of the dog, and in every changing emotion of which he is capable. This is probably what is often meant by condition and quality.