This is the best essay about a dog that I've read.
It's from An Outside Chance by Thomas McGuane, and was first published in Sports Illustrated.
It won't make you cry.
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1086827/1/index.htm
I'm not a hunter, and I've never had a pointer.
But McGuane understands dogs.