ONLY A DOG.

Globe, Volume XXIII, Issue 2369, 5 November 1881, Page 3

ONLY A DOG.

We were all crying, every one of us. Father declared it was smoke that had got into his eyes and made them smart; but mother threw her apron over her head and sat rooking and sobbing for ten minutes. Phoebe and I just threw ourselves down on the floor by poor Leo, and I took his dear old shaggy head in my lap, and the hot tears dropped one by one, and Phoebe petted his poor old stiff ears and smoothed out his thin, gray hairs; and then wo took off the old brasa collar that was marked all over with hieroglyphics that wo had scratched with pins in the proud days when he first wore it; then we cried again, and just then in walked Squire Toots, and he didn’t seem to know what to do when he saw us all so distressed. He looked at us and then at Leo, then he took out his handkerchief and gave his nose a real Sunday school blowing, and said kind of huskily : " Why it’s wicked to feel s’ bad. Anybody d’ spose it was a pusson ; ’taint only a dog.” That just made us all feel worse. There wasn’t any heaven for him to go to, and we knew we never could sea him again, and we couldn’t remember any life without Loo, we were such little tots when he came to us, and ho had been one of the family all the time. Father used to lecture him just did ns children. “ Where did I see you to-day, sir?’ he would say “Over at Mr Mason’s associating with that dog that steals ! Shame 1” And then Leo would whine, and pretty soon father would say 11 Go to bod, sir!” and he’d sneak off to his box in the back shed and lay awake all night to protect us while we slept, and he never once in over fourteen years was forgetful of hia trust — and ho was “ only a dog.” Only a dog ! Why, was there ever a time that we went racing home from school that Leo hadn’t met us half-way to race with us and do all sorts of funny tricks at our bidding, and how proud we had always been of him with bis handsome stately presence and superior manners, and how safe we felt to hear his deep-chested bark as we went to sleep. Well, death had found him sure enough, and we buried him out in the grove in a little hollow, where he loved to lie on hot summer days, and there will be no resurrection for him, though there will be for the vilest thief he kept from our doors ; but none the less, in looking over bis honest, blameless life, in which he was never faithless to any, oven the smallest trust, I dare apply to him the Master’s meed of praise, “Well done, good and faithful servant though, as Squire Toots said, “ He was only a dog,”