The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1916-1920, 1919-08-31
Hares and Hounds

OF any kind, and especially to owners who
live In the country or the suburbs where
the nearest veterinary is not always with
call. A good share of the book deals with
general canine principles, including d.s-
eases, which are the same for the field
trials champion Llewellin and the mixiest
yellow mutt-except that the mutt has IL
tinitely more stamina and resistancel
Doubtless each professional vet WI
take his own exceptions to Mr.. Millers
therapeutics, on the ground that Mr..
Miller is an amateur. He IS, however, a
good amateur to bank on. He has had muck
personal experience of number of stand
ard breeds, particularly the Airedale, Of
which he was one of this country's earliest
champions. We have yet to see the first
dog book whose author lacked some dog
hobby. The Airedale is Mr.. Miller's.
With watchdogs in question, he cheer
fully prefers the Airedale if you want
dog that can kill tramp instead Of
merely barking at him." And "he is tire
greatest of the terriers and the one who
can and is being successfully trained TO
hunt everything alive that can be huntel.
lacking bear or cougar, routing out
woodehueks, jumping rabbits, tree mark
ing squirrels, pointing grouse and quail.
running pheasants and retrieving any and
all of them-the Airedale properly trained
has done all these things in hundreds and
hundreds of individual instances"
Plainly, here is the canine preventive
of Bolshevism in America. 1t would ii
vert US to see an Airedale retrieve a bea-;
perhaps that is more than Mr.. Miller in
tended to convey. He appends prudent
proviso: "While they breed pretty true %
type, there is Il good deal in the fortunate
selection of the individual Airedale" There
is. The breed is comparatively new and
its mental characteristics are not uni
formly stabilized. OF a dozen Airedales
taken as they come, eleven will be good
dogs, and some Of these more than merely
good, but the twelfth is likely to turn out
q dunderheaded fool And while any breed
throws up its percentage of fools, a fool
Airedale is just about the most hopeless
and awkward proposition possible.
1t is true among dogs as among-well,
literary geniuses-that what the world
counts a fool may be great soul mis-
understood. We have in mind an Aire-
dale raised by friends of ours. His name
was Quogue; it should have been Oliver
Goldsmith. At an early age he acquired
the reputation of an imbecile. He was
devoted TO the children and would let the
baby pull out his hair in handfuls by
the hour, but his hunting instincts APP
peared in a penchant for retrieving live
chickens belonging to the neighbors.
These (the chickens, not the neighbors)
he was wont to deliver dead. 1t seemed
to us proof of his superior sagacity, con-
sidering the cost of living and his masters
chicken raided garden. But his mortified
master took different view, in which the
neighbors heartily concurred. Also, he
was fght-shy and could be bulldozed by
any Flopit-until a great change came
over him, whereafter he thought nothing
of killing five or six assorted dogs in the
morning before breakfast. And no
amount of tying up would cure him of
running away.
Still, as his coat kept the baby indus
trious and reasonably quiet, he was borne
with for two years. At the end of that
time he bit a 'cellist. The world, which
did not understand him, said the bite was
unprovoked- But the world had not hearl
the 'cellist, and Quogue had. AS the bite
was Of nature calculated to interfere
with ceiling for a considerable period,
Quogue's owner became patron of tic
art of chamber music and Quogue was
discarded without the benefit of jury
trial or even of psychoanalysis. We