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A Dog's Tale
Author:
Mark Twain
My
father was a St. Bernard, my mother was a collie,
but I am a Presbyterian. This is what my
mother told me, I do not know these
nice distinctions myself. To me they are only fine
large words
meaning nothing. My mother
had a fondness for such; she liked to say them,
and see other dogs
look surprised and
envious, as wondering how she got so much
education. But, indeed, it was not
real
education;
it
was
only
show:
she
got
the
words
by
listening
in
the
dining-room
and
drawing-room
when
there
was
company,
and
by
going
with
the
children
to
Sunday-school
and
listening there; and whenever she heard
a large word she said it over to herself many
times, and so
was able to keep it until
there was a dogmatic gathering in the
neighborhood, then she would get it
off, and surprise and distress them
all, from pocket-pup to mastiff, which rewarded
her for all her
trouble. If there was a
stranger he was nearly sure to be suspicious, and
when he got his breath
again he would
ask her what it meant. And she always told him. He
was never expecting this but
thought he
would catch her; so when she told him, he was the
one that looked ashamed, whereas
he had
thought it was going to be she. The others were
always waiting for this, and glad of it and
proud of her, for they knew what was
going to happen, because they had had experience.
When
she told the meaning of a big word
they were all so taken up with admiration that it
never occurred
to
any
dog
to
doubt
if
it
was
the
right
one;
and
that
was
natural,
because,
for
one
thing,
she
answered up so promptly
that it seemed like a dictionary speaking, and for
another thing, where
could they find
out whether it was right or not? for she was the
only cultivated dog there was. By
and
by,
when
I
was
older,
she
brought
home
the
word
Unintellectual,
one
time,
and
worked
it
pretty
hard all the week at different gatherings, making
much unhappiness and despondency; and
it
was
at
this
time
that
I
noticed
that
during
that
week
she
was
asked
for
the
meaning
at
eight
different assemblages, and flashed out
a fresh definition every time, which showed
me that she
had more
presence of mind than culture, though I said
nothing, of course. She had one word which
she always kept on hand, and ready,
like a life-preserver, a kind of emergency word to
strap on
when she was likely to get
washed overboard in a sudden way--that was the
word Synonymous.
When she happened to
fetch out a long word which had had its day weeks
before and its prepared
meanings gone
to her dump-pile, if there was a stranger there of
course it knocked him groggy for
a
couple of minutes, then he would come to, and by
that time she would be away down wind on
another tack, and not expecting
anything; so when he'd hail and ask her to cash
in, I (the only dog
on the inside of
her game) could see her canvas flicker a moment--
but only just a moment--then it
would
belly out taut and full, and she would say, as
calm as a summer's day,
supererogation,
away on the
next tack, perfectly comfortable, you know, and
leave that stranger looking profane
and
embarrassed,
and
the
initiated
slatting
the
floor
with
their
tails
in
unison
and
their
faces
transfigured with a holy joy.
And it was the
same with phrases. She would drag home a whole
phrase, if it had a grand sound,
and
play it six nights and two matinees, and explain
it a new way every time--which she had to,
for all she cared for was the phrase;
she wasn't interested in what it meant, and knew
those dogs
hadn't
wit
enough
to
catch
her,
anyway.
Yes,
she
was
a
daisy!
She
got
so
she
wasn't
afraid
of
anything, she had such confidence in
the ignorance of those creatures. She even brought
anecdotes
that
she had heard the family and the dinner-guests
laugh and shout over; and as a rule she got the
nub of one chestnut hitched onto
another chestnut, where, of course, it didn't fit
and hadn't any
point; and when she
delivered the nub she fell over and rolled on the
floor and laughed and barked
in the
most insane way, while I could see that she was
wondering to herself why it didn't seem as
funny as it did when she first heard
it. But no harm was done; the others rolled and
barked too,
privately ashamed of
themselves for not seeing the point, and never
suspecting that the fault was
not with
them and there wasn't any to see.
You can see by these things
that she was of a rather vain and frivolous
character; still, she had
virtues, and
enough to make up, I think. She had a kind heart
and gentle ways, and never harbored
resentments for injuries done her, but
put them easily out of her mind and forgot them;
and she
taught her children her kindly
way, and from her we learned also to be brave and
prompt in time of
danger, and not to
run away, but face the peril that threatened
friend or stranger, and help him the
best we could without stopping to think
what the cost might be to us. And she taught us
not by
words only, but by example, and
that is the best way and the surest and the most
lasting. Why, the
brave things she did,
the splendid things! she was just a soldier; and
so modest about it--well, you
couldn't
help admiring her, and you couldn't help imitating
her; not even a King Charles spaniel
could
remain
entirely
despicable
in
her
society.
So,
as
you
see,
there
was
more
to
her
than
her
education.
When I was well grown, at
last, I was sold and taken away, and I never saw
her again. She was
broken-hearted, and
so was I, and we cried; but she comforted me as
well as she could, and said
we were
sent into this world for a wise and good purpose,
and must do our duties without repining,
take
our
life
as
we
might
find
it,
live
it
for
the
best
good
of
others,
and
never
mind
about
the
results; they were not our affair. She
said men who did like this would have a noble and
beautiful
reward by and by in another
world, and although we animals would not go there,
to do well and
right without reward
would give to our brief lives a worthiness and
dignity which in itself would
be
a
reward.
She
had
gathered
these
things
from
time
to
time
when
she
had
gone
to
the
Sunday-school with the children, and
had laid them up in her memory more carefully than
she had
done with those other words and
phrases; and she had studied them deeply, for her
good and ours.
One may see by this that
she had a wise and thoughtful head, for all there
was so much lightness
and vanity in it.
So we said our
farewells, and looked our last upon each other
through our tears; and the last thing
she said--keeping it for the last to
make me remember it the better, I think--was,
me, when there is a time of danger to
another do not think of yourself, think of your
mother, and
do as she would
do.
Do you think
I could forget that? No.
It
was
such
a
charming
home!
--my
new
one;
a
fine
great
house,
with
pictures,
and
delicate
decorations, and rich furniture, and no
gloom anywhere, but all the wilderness of dainty
colors lit
up
with
flooding
sunshine;
and
the
spacious
grounds
around
it,
and
the
great
garden
--oh,
greensward, and noble trees, and
flowers, no end! And I was the same as a member of
the family;
and they loved me, and
petted me, and did not give me a new name, but
called me by my old one
that was dear
to me because my mother had given it me--Aileen
Mavourneen. She got it out of a
song;
and the Grays knew that song, and said it was a
beautiful name.
Mrs. Gray was thirty, and so sweet and
so lovely, you cannot imagine it; and Sadie was
ten, and
just like her mother, just a
darling slender little copy of her, with auburn
tails down her back, and
short
frocks;
and
the
baby
was
a
year
old,
and
plump
and
dimpled,
and
fond
of me,
and
never
could get enough of
hauling on my tail, and hugging me, and laughing
out its innocent happiness;
and Mr.
Gray was thirty-eight, and tall and slender and
handsome, a little bald in front, alert, quick
in
his
movements,
business-like,
prompt,
decided,
unsentimental,
and
with
that
kind
of
trim-
chiseled
face
that
just
seems
to
glint
and
sparkle
with
frosty
intellectuality!
He
was
a
renowned
scientist. I do not know what the word means, but
my mother would know how to use it
and
get effects. She would know how to depress a rat-
terrier with it and make a lap-dog look sorry
he came. But that is not the best one;
the best one was Laboratory. My mother could
organize a
Trust on that one that would
skin the tax-collars off the whole herd. The
laboratory was not a book,
or a
picture, or a place to wash your hands in, as the
college president's dog said--no, that is the
lavatory;
the
laboratory
is
quite
different,
and
is
filled
with
jars,
and
bottles,
and
electrics,
and
wires, and strange machines; and every
week other scientists came there and sat in the
place, and
used the machines, and
discussed, and made what they
called
experiments and discoveries; and
often
I came, too, and stood around and listened, and
tried to learn, for the sake of my mother, and
in loving memory of her, although it
was a pain to me, as realizing what she was losing
out of her
life and I gaining nothing
at all; for try as I might, I was never able to
make anything out of it at
all.
Other times
I lay on the floor in the
mistress's
work-room and
slept, she gently using me for a
foot-
stool, knowing it pleased me, for it was a caress;
other times I spent an hour in the nursery,
and got well tousled and made happy;
other times I watched by the crib there, when the
baby was
asleep and the nurse out for a
few minutes on the baby's affairs; other times I
romped and raced
through the grounds
and the garden with Sadie till we were tired out,
then slumbered on the grass
in
the
shade of
a
tree
while
she
read her book; other
times
I
went
visiting
among the
neighbor
dogs--for there were some most pleasant
ones not far away, and one very handsome and
courteous
and graceful one, a curly-
haired Irish setter by the name of Robin Adair,
who was a Presbyterian
like me, and
belonged to the Scotch minister.
The servants in our house
were all kind to me and were fond of me, and so,
as you see, mine was a
pleasant life.
There could not be a happier dog that I was, nor a
gratefuller one. I will say this for
myself,
for
it
is
only
the
truth:
I
tried
in
all
ways
to
do
well
and
right,
and
honor
my
mother's
memory and her teachings, and earn the
happiness that had come to me, as best I could.
By and by came
my little puppy, and then my cup was full, my
happiness was perfect. It was the
dearest
little
waddling
thing,
and
so
smooth
and
soft
and
velvety,
and
had
such
cunning
little
awkward paws, and
such affectionate eyes, and such a sweet and
innocent face; and it made me so
proud to see how the
children and their mother adored it, and fondled
it, and exclaimed over every
little
wonderful thing it did. It did seem to me that
life was just too lovely to--
Then came the winter. One
day I was standing a watch in the nursery. That is
to say, I was asleep
on the bed. The
baby was asleep in the crib, which was alongside
the bed, on the side next the
fireplace. It was the kind of crib that
has a lofty tent over it made of gauzy stuff that
you can see
through. The nurse was out,
and we two sleepers were alone. A spark from the
wood-fire was shot
out, and it lit on
the slope of the tent. I suppose a quiet interval
followed, then a scream from the
baby
awoke
me,
and
there
was
that
tent
flaming
up
toward
the
ceiling!
Before
I
could
think,
I
sprang
to
the
floor
in
my
fright,
and
in
a
second
was
half-way
to
the
door;
but
in
the
next
half-
second my
mother's farewell was
sounding in my
ears, and I was back on
the bed again. I
reached my head
through the flames and dragged the baby out by the
waist-band, and tugged it
along, and we
fell to the floor together in a cloud of smoke; I
snatched a new hold, and dragged
the
screaming little creature along and out at the
door and around the bend of the hall, and was
still
tugging away, all excited and
happy and proud, when the master's voice shouted:
me
up, striking furiously at me with his cane, I
dodging this way and that, in terror, and at last
a
strong blow fell upon my left
foreleg, which made me shriek and fall, for the
moment, helpless;
the
cane
went
up
for
another
blow,
but
never
descended,
for
the
nurse's
voice
rang
wildly
out,
saved.
The pain was
cruel, but, no matter, I must not lose any time;
he might come back at any moment;
so I
limped on three legs to the other end of the hall,
where there was a dark little stairway leading
up into a garret where old boxes and
such things were kept, as I had heard say, and
where people
seldom went. I managed to
climb up there, then I searched my way through the
dark among the
piles of things, and hid
in the secretest place I could find. It was
foolish to be afraid there, yet still
I
was;
so
afraid
that
I
held
in
and
hardly
even
whimpered,
though
it
would
have
been
such
a
comfort to whimper,
because that eases the pain, you know. But I could
lick my leg, and that did
some good.
For
half
an
hour
there
was
a
commotion
downstairs,
and
shoutings,
and
rushing
footsteps,
and
then there was quiet again. Quiet for
some minutes, and that was grateful to my spirit,
for then my
fears began to go down; and
fears are worse than pains--oh, much worse. Then
came a sound that
froze me. They were
calling me--calling me by name--hunting for me!
It was muffled
by distance, but that could not take the terror
out of it, and it was the most dreadful
sound
to
me
that
I
had
ever
heard.
It
went
all
about,
everywhere,
down
there:
along
the
halls,
through all the
rooms, in both stories, and in the basement and
the cellar; then outside, and farther
and farther away--then back, and all
about the house again, and I thought it would
never, never
stop. But at last it did,
hours and hours after the vague twilight of the
garret had long ago been
blotted out by
black darkness.
Then in that
blessed stillness my terrors fell little by little
away, and I was at peace and slept. It
was
a
good
rest
I
had,
but
I
woke
before
the
twilight
had
come
again.
I
was
feeling
fairly
comfortable, and I could think out a
plan now. I made a very good one; which was, to
creep down,
all the way down the back
stairs, and hide behind the cellar door, and slip
out and escape when the
iceman came at
dawn, while he was inside filling the
refrigerator; then I would hide all day, and
start on my journey when night came; my
journey to--well, anywhere where they would not
know
me and betray me to the master. I
was feeling almost cheerful now; then suddenly I
thought: Why,
what would life be
without my puppy!
That was despair. There was no plan for
me; I saw that; I must stay where I was; stay, and
wait,
and
take
what
might
come--
it
was
not
my
affair;
that
was
what
life
is--my
mother
had
said
it.
Then--well, then the
calling began again! All my sorrows came back. I
said to myself, the master
will never
forgive. I did not know what I had done to make
him so bitter and so unforgiving, yet I
judged it was something a dog could not
understand, but which was clear to a man and
dreadful.
They
called and called--days and nights, it seemed to
me. So long that the hunger and thirst near
drove me mad, and I recognized that I
was getting very weak. When you are this way you
sleep a
great deal, and I did. Once I
woke in an awful fright--it seemed to me that the
calling was right
there in the garret!
And so it was: it was Sadie's voice, and she was
crying; my name was falling
from her
lips all broken, poor thing, and I could not
believe my ears for the joy of it when I heard
her say:
I
broke
in
with
SUCH
a
grateful
little
yelp,
and
the
next
moment
Sadie
was
plunging
and
stumbling through the darkness and the
lumber and shouting for the family to hear,
she's found!
The days that followed--well, they were
wonderful. The mother and Sadie and the servants--
why,
they just seemed to worship me.
They couldn't seem to make me a bed that was fine
enough; and
as
for
food,
they
couldn't
be
satisfied
with
anything
but
game
and
delicacies
that
were
out
of
season; and every day the
friends and neighbors flocked in to hear about my
heroism--that was the
name they called
it by, and it means agriculture. I remember my
mother pulling it on a kennel once,
and
explaining it in that way, but didn't say what
agriculture was, except that it was synonymous
with intramural incandescence; and a
dozen times a day Mrs. Gray and Sadie would tell
the tale to
new-comers, and say I
risked my life to say the baby's, and both of us
had burns to prove it, and
then the
company would pass me around and pet me and
exclaim about me, and you could see the
pride in the eyes of Sadie and her
mother; and when the people wanted to know what
made me
limp, they looked ashamed and
changed the subject, and sometimes when people
hunted them this
way and that way with
questions about it, it looked to me as if they
were going to cry.
And
this
was
not
all
the
glory;
no,
the
master's
friends
came,
a
whole
twenty
of
the
most
distinguished
people,
and
had
me
in
the
laboratory,
and
discussed
me
as
if
I
was
a
kind
of
discovery;
and
some
of
them
said
it
was
wonderful
in
a
dumb
beast,
the
finest
exhibition
of
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