A SAGACIOUS DOG AND CONFECTIONERY.

Kumara Times, Issue 2712, 1 June 1885, Page 2

A SAGACIOUS DOG AND CONFECTIONERY.

A correspondent of the Spectator "ives the following:—“One summer afternoon a group of children were playing at the end of a pier which projects into Lake Ontario, near Kingston, New York, U.S.A. The proverbial careless child of the party made the proverbial backward step off from the pier into the water. None of his companions could save him, and their cries had brought no one from the shore, when, just as he was sinking for the third time, a superb Newfoundland dog rushed down the pier and pulled the boy out. Those of the children who did not accompany the boy home took the dog to a confectioner’s'on the shore, and fed him with as great a variety of cakes and other sweets as he would eat. So far the story is, of course, only typical of scores of well-known cases. The individuality of this case is left for the sequel. The next afternoon, (he same group of children were playing at the same place, when the canine hero of the day before came trotting down to them with the most friendly wavs and nods. There being no occasion this time for supplying him with delicacies, the children only stroked and patted him. The dog, however, had not come out of pure sociability. A child in the water and cakes and candy stood lo him in the close and obvious relation of cause and effect, and if this relation was not clear to the children he resolved to impress it upon them’ Watching his chance, he crept up behind the child who was standing nearest to the edge of the pier, gave a sudden push, which seat him into the water, then sprang in after him and gravely brought him to the shoic.” What the dog’s reward was on the second occasion the story does not say.