... for which I heartily thank you as she serveth me to great purpose. For she maketh my hunting very certain and speedy. She hath never failed me, for almost every day this week but brought me in the right way to a deer. And this last week she brought me to a stag which myself had stricken with my bow, being forced to the soil where, with the help of a greater water spaniel that forced him out of the water, your good brach helped to pluck him down.

Letter to the Earl of Leicester on a hunting dog he had given Burghley, c. 1580-81.