etc., and the last in subtlety and deceitfulness.  These (saith Strabo) are most apt for game, and called Sagaces by a general name, not only because of their skill in hunting, but also for that they know their own and the names of their fellows most exactly.  For if the hunter see any one to follow skilfully, and with likelihood of good success, he biddeth the rest to hark and follow such a dog, and they eftsoones obey so soon as they hear his name.  The first kind of these are often called harriers, whose game is the fox, the hare, the wolf (if we had any), hart, buck, badger, otter, polecat, lopstart, weasel, conie, etc.:  the second height a terrier and it hunteth the badger and grey only:  the third a bloodhound, whose office is to follow the fierce, and now and then to pursue a thief or beast by his dry foot:  the fourth height a gazehound, who hunteth by the eye:  the fifth a greyhound, cherished for his strength and swiftness and stature, commended by Bratius in his De Venatione, and not unremembered by Hercules Stroza in a like treatise, and above all other those of Britain, where he saith:  “Magna spectandi mole Britanni;” also by Nemesianus, libro Cynegeticon, where he saith:  “Divisa Britannia mittit Veloces nostrique orbis venatibus aptos,” of which sort also some be smooth, of sundry colours, and some shake-haired:  the sixth a liemer, that excelleth in smelling and swift-running:  the seventh a tumbler:  and the eighth a thief whose offices (I mean of the latter two) incline only to deceit, wherein they are oft so skilful that few men would think so mischievous a wit to remain in such silly creatures.  Having made this enumeration of dogs which are apt for the chase and hunting, he cometh next to such as serve the falcons in their time, whereof he maketh also two sorts.  One that findeth his game on the land, another that putteth up such fowl as keepeth in the water:  and of these this is commonly most usual for the net or train, the other for the hawk, as he doth shew at large.  Of the first he saith that they have no peculiar names assigned to them severally, but each of them is called after the bird which by natural appointment he is alloted to hunt or serve, for which consideration some be named dogs for the pheasant, some for the falcon, and some for the partridge.  Howbeit the common name for all is spaniel (saith he), and thereupon alluded as if these kinds of dogs had been brought hither out of Spain.  In like sort we have of water spaniels in their kind.  The third sort of dogs of the gentle kind is the spaniel gentle, or comforter, or (as the common term is) the fistinghound, and those are called Melitei, of the Island Malta, from whence they were brought hither.  These are little and pretty, proper and fine, and sought out far and near to falsify the nice delicacy of dainty dames, and wanton women’s wills, instruments of folly to play and dally withal, in trifling away the treasure of time, to withdraw their minds from more commendable