We prefer the high-bred, smooth, English terrier, to any other variety. They are rather more gentle in temper, and very much handsomer in appearance, than the rough-haired kind; but perhaps no better in their useful qualities. We have kept them for years; we keep them now; and no reasonable inducement would let us part with them. A year or two ago, having accidentally lost our farm terrier, and nothing remaining on the place but our shepherd dog, the buildings soon swarmed with rats. They were in, and about everything. During the winter, the men who tended the horses, and cattle, at their nightly rounds of inspection, before going to bed, would kill, with their clubs, three or four, in the barns and stables, every evening. But still the rats increased, and they became unendurable. They got into the grain-mows, where they burrowed, and brought forth with a fecundity second only to the frogs of Egypt. They gnawed into the granaries. They dug into the dairy. They entered the meat barrels. They carried off the eggs from the hen-nests. They stole away, and devoured, the young ducks, and chickens. They literally came into the "kneading troughs" of the kitchen. Oh! the rats were intolerable! Traps were no use. Arsenic was innocuous--they wouldn't touch it. Opportunity favored us, and we got two high-bred, smooth, English terriers--a dog, and a slut. Then commenced such a slaughter as we seldom see. The rats had got bold. The dogs caught them daily by dozens, as they came out from their haunts, fearless of evil, as before. As they grew more shy, their holes were watched, and every morning dead rats were found about the premises. The dogs, during the day, pointed out their holes. Planks were removed, nests were found, and the rats, young and old, killed, _instanter_. Hundreds on hundreds were slaughtered, in the first few weeks; and in a short time, the place was mostly rid of them, until enough only are left to keep the dogs "in play," and to show that in spite of all precaution, they will harbor wherever there is a thing to eat, and a possible place of covert for them to burrow. To have the terrier in full perfection, it is important that the breed be _pure_. We are so prone to mix up everything we get, in this country, that it is sometimes difficult to get anything exactly as it should be; but a little care will provide us, in this particular. He should be properly trained, too, when young. That is, to mind what is said to him. His intelligence will be equal to all your wants in the _dog_-line; but he should not be _fooled_ with. His instincts are _sure_. And, with a good education, the terrier will prove all you need in a farm, and a watch-dog. We speak from long experience, and observation. [Illustration: THE SHEPHERD DOG.]