Then women's tears of happiness

With praises blend :

And old men lift their hands and bless,

And strong men fondle and caress

Their shaggy friend."1

This dog was a noble fellow of the Newfoundland breed.

CHAPTER VIII.

THE following, from a first authority, appears to show pre

sentiment in a dog:

"We were stationed in the Ghauts, between Bombay and Goa, a magnificent country of forest and mountain, running streams and springs-where the eye was constantly gladdened by new flowers, plants, and trees, strange bright birds, and numerous wild creatures. It was quite a wilderness of a country, high up on the hills, often shrouded in mists for days together in the rains, and which, when the veil lifted, suddenly opened to our view a wide expanse of woods and waters far below us. Wild animals abounded. The cheetahs or hunting leopards were particularly numerous. They carried off our pet deer, though we had, as we thought, made them quite secure by chaining them at night in a shed surrounded by mud walls and reeds. Nevertheless, the cheetahs one night burst in and carried all our little favourites away. We had a large English dog, of the retriever breed, named Watch. He slept in the verandah by the side of the native guard, and though the leopards prowled continually about the bungalow after dark, he was considered to be perfectly safe. One night he was very uneasy on our going to bed, scratched at the door, whined, and was most anxious to come inside. Unfortunately he was

VOL. I.

K

not admitted. That night it thundered and lightened exceedingly, and rained in torrents. Suddenly, about midnight, we heard the dog give a piercing howl, and the watchman fire his gun. We started up in bed-poor Watch was gone! Occasionally between the peals of thunder we heard his howls growing fainter and fainter, and farther off in the jungle a cheetah had taken him. In the morning we sent natives to track him, and they found his remains, with those of deer and other animals, in a cave.”

It is impossible to credit the attendant quotation from Raleigh, Book iv. p, 153, it being so totally inconsistent with, and in opposition to, the whole nature of the dog. The same account is also in Camerarius, and is given here at p. 189:

"The strangest thing that I have read of in this kind (portents), being certainly true, was, that the night before the battle at Moscow, all the dogs which followed the French army ran from them to the Switzers, leaping and fawning upon them, as if they had been bred and fed by them all their lives; and in the morning following, Trivalzi and Tremouille, Generals for Louis XII., were by these Imperial Switzers utterly broken and put to ruin.”

A belief in the supernatural power of the dog to foresee coming death, and also to perceive beings of the spiritual world has existed for ages. Thus in the Odyssey,' when Minerva appears to Ulysses alone, and not to Telemachus, the dogs nevertheless are aware of her presence:

"The dogs intelligent, confess'd the tread

Of pow'r divine, and howling, trembling fled."

In 'Hone's Year Book' it is stated, that "many believe

that the howlings of a dog foretell death, and that dogs can see Death enter the houses of people who are about to die." This superstition is still very common in England.

In the Gentleman's Magazine,' vol. i., p. 31, is an account of a ghost, in the form of a dog.

The Mauthe dog of Peel Castle, in the Isle of Man, mentioned in the notes to Peveril of the Peak,' will occur to most. Cornelius Agrippa's dog also had a bad name. Bayle says he was not the Devil his servant Wier testifies, but a black dog whom he called Monsieur, and for whom he got a black she-dog, and called her name Mademoiselle. Southey, however, gives instances of dogs who bore a very different reputation. "A dog at Congreve," says the poet, "went regularly every Sunday to Penkridge church, during a whole year that the church was under repair, and if he could get in, passed the proper time in the family pew." And "The Methodist dog regularly attended chapel alone, though pelted by the church boys. His master never went, and when he

164

"Agrippa kept a Stygian Pug

I' th' Garb and Habit of a Dog,
That was his Tutor, and the Cur
Read to th' occult Philosopher,
And taught him subtly to maintain
All other Sciences are vain.

To this, quoth Sidrophel, 'Oh! Sir,
Agrippa was no Conjurer,

Nor Paracelsus, no nor Behmen,
Nor was the Dog a Cacodæmon,

But a true Dog that would show Tricks
For th' Emperor, and leap o'er Sticks;
Would fetch and carry, was more civil
Than other Dogs, but yet no Devil :
And whatsoe'er he's said to do,
He went the self-same way we go.'"

Hulibras, Canto 6.

was drowned in a fit of intoxication, the dog ceased coming." John Nelson used to say, "The frequent attendance of this dog at the meeting was designed to attract his master's curiosity, and engage him thereby to visit the place, where, hearing the gospel, he might have been enlightened, converted, and eternally saved." But, added he, "the end to be answered being frustrated by his death, the means to secure it were no longer needful." Quare? Wesley.

Some more amusing and original anecdotes of dogs connected with the church, are now given.

"When my father and his family lived at Berry Head he had a large black Newfoundland dog, who rendered himself quite notorious in the neighbourhood from the regularity with which he attended the funerals. No sooner did the procession appear on the road leading to the church than the dog darted off at full speed. Having joined it he composed his demeanour, walked quietly up and took his place as chief mourner immediately after the coffin, and so accompanied it to the place of interment; thence returning quickly home when the ceremony was over."

The next story is still more curious.

"The Rev. Mr. L. had a large bloodhound which had been allowed to acquire the habit of accompanying the household to church, where he always behaved with the greatest decorum, lying at the foot of the pulpit stairs, till one unfortunate day, when a stranger officiated in lieu of his master. The dog seemed to take no notice until the communion service; but when the stranger was within