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Peck's Sunshine, a fiction by George W. Peck |
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How Sharper Than A Hound's Tooth |
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_ Years ago we swore on a stack of red chips that we would never own another dog. Six promising pups that had been presented to us, blooded setters and pointers, had gone the way of all dog flesh, with the distemper and dog buttons, and by falling in the cistern, and we had been bereaved _via_ dog misfortunes as often as John R. Bennett, of Janesville, has been bereaved on the nomination for attorney general. We could not look a pup in the face but it would get sick, and so we concluded never again to own a dog. The vow has been religiously kept since. Men have promised us thousands of pups, but we have never taken them. One conductor has promised us at least seventy-five pups, but he has always failed to get us to take one. Dog lovers have set up nights to devise a way to induce us to accept a dog. We held out firmly until last week. One day we met Pierce, the Watertown Junction hotel man, and he told us he had a greyhound pup that was the finest bread dog--we think he said bread dog, though it might have been a sausage dog he said--anyway he told us it was blooded, and that when it grew up to be a man--that is, figuratively speaking--when it grew up to be a dog full size, it would be the handsomest canine in the Northwest. We kicked on it, entirely, at first, but when he told us hundreds of men who had seen the pup had offered him thousands of dollars for it, but that he had rather give it to a friend than sell it to a stranger; we weakened, and told him to send it in. Well--(excuse us while we go into a corner and mutter a silent remark)--it came in on the train Monday, and was taken to the barn. It is the confoundedest looking dog that a white man ever set eyes on. It is about the color of putty, and about seven feet long, though it is only six months old. The tail is longer than a whip lash, and when you speak sassy to that dog, the tail will begin to curl around under him, amongst his legs, double around over his neck and back over where the tail originally was hitched to the dog, and then there is tail enough left for four ordinary dogs. It is the longest tail we have ever seen in one number. If that tail was cut up into ordinary tails, such as common dogs wear, there would be enough for all the dogs in the Seventh ward, with enough left for a white wire clothes line. When he lays down his tail curls up like a coil of telephone wire, and if you take hold of it and wring you can hear the dog at the central office. If that dog is as long in proportion, when he gets his growth, and his tail grows as much as his body does, the dog will reach from here to the Soldier's home. His head is about as big as a graham gem, and runs down to a point not bigger than a cambric needle, while his ears are about as big as a thumb to a glove, and they hang down as though the dog didn't want to hear anything. How a head of that kind can contain brains enough to cause a dog to know enough to go in when it rains is a mystery. But he seems to be intelligent. If a man comes along on the sidewalk, the dog will follow him off, follow him until he meets another man, and then he follows _him_ till he meets another, and so on until he has followed the entire population. He is not an aristocratic dog, but will follow one person just as soon as another, and to see him going along the street, with his tail coiled up, apparently oblivious to every human sentiment, it is touching. His legs are about the size of pipe stems, and his feet are as big as a base ball base. He wanders around, following a boy, then a middle aged man, then a little girl, then an old man, and finally, about meal time, the last person he follows seems to go by the barn and the dog wanders in and looks for a buffalo robe or a harness tug to chew. It does not cost anything to keep him, as he has only eaten one trotting harness and one fox skin robe since Monday, though it may not be right to judge of his appetite, as he may be a little off his feed. Pierce said he would be a nice dog to run with a horse, or under a carriage. Why, bless you, he won't go within twenty feet of a horse, and a horse would run away to look at him; besides, he gets right under a carriage wheel, and when the wheel runs over him he complains, and sings Pinafore. What under the sun that dog is ever going to be good for is more than we know. He is too lean and bony for sausage. A piece of that dog as big as your finger in a sausage would ruin a butcher. It would be a dead give away. He looks as though he might point game, if the game was brought to his attention, but he would be just as liable to point a cow. He might do to stuff and place in a front yard to frighten burglars. If a burglar wouldn't be frightened at that dog nothing would scare him. Anyway, now we have got him, we will bring him up, though it seems as though he would resemble a truss bridge or a refrigerator car, as much as a dog, when he gets his growth. For fear he will follow off a wagon track we tie a knot in his tail. Parties who have never seen a very long dog can call at the barn about meal time and see him. _ |
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