第19章 A RUINED DOG(1)

"I WAS a sporting dog," he said, bitterly, "for the first three years of my life. I belonged to a man who keeps a livery stable here in Fairport, and he used to hire me out shooting parties.

"I was a favorite with all the gentlemen. I was crazy with delight when I saw the guns brought out, and would jump up and bite at them. I loved to chase birds and rabbits, and even now when the pigeons come near me, I tremble all over and have to turn away lest I should seize them. I used often to be in the woods from morning till night. I liked to have a hard search after a bird after it had been shot, and to be praised for bringing it out without biting or injuring it.

"I never got lost, for I am one of those dogs that can always tell where human beings are. I did not smell them. I would be too far away for that, but if my master was standing in some place and Itook a long round through the woods, I knew exactly where he was, and could make a short cut back to him without returning in my tracks.

"But I must tell you about my trouble. One Saturday afternoon a party of young men came to get me. They had a dog with them, a cocker spaniel called Bob, but they wanted another. For some reason or other, my master was very unwilling to have me go.

However, he at last consented, and they put me in the back of the wagon with Bob and the lunch baskets, and we drove off into the country. This Bob was a happy, merry-looking dog, and as we went along, he told me of the fine time we should have next day.

The young men would shoot a little, then they would get out their baskets and have something to eat and drink, and would play cards and go to sleep under the trees, and we would be able to help ourselves to legs and wings of chickens, and anything we liked from the baskets.

"I did not like this at all. I was used to working hard through the week, and I liked to spend my Sundays quietly at home. However, I said nothing.

"That night we slept at a country hotel, and drove the next morning to the banks of a small lake where the young men were told there would be plenty of wild ducks. They were in no hurry to begin their sport. They sat down in the sun on some flat rocks at the water's edge, and said they would have something to drink before setting to work. They got out some of the bottles from the wagon, and began to take long drinks from them. Then they got quarrelsome and mischievous and seemed to forget all about their shooting. One of them proposed to have some fun with the dogs.

They tied us both to a tree, and throwing a stick in the water, told us to get it. Of course we struggled and tried to get free, and chafed our necks with the rope.

"After a time one of them began to swear at me, and say that he believed I was gun-shy. He staggered to the wagon and got out his fowling piece, and said he was going to try me.

"He loaded it, went to a little distance, and was going to fire, when the young man who owned Bob said he wasn't going to have his dog's legs shot off, and coming up he unfastened him and took him away. You can imagine my feelings, as I stood there tied to the tree, with that stranger pointing his gun directly at me. He fired close to me, a number of times over my head and under my body.

The earth was cut up all around me. I was terribly frightened, and howled and begged to be freed.

"The other young men, who were sitting laughing at me, thought it such good fun that they got their guns, too. I never wish to spend such a terrible hour again. I was sure they would kill me. I dare say they would have done so, for they were all quite drunk by this time, if something had not happened.