His Way Of Going On Is To Make A Companion Of
Me Whether I Want Him Or Not.
I do not want him, but his idea
is that I want him very much.
I bitterly blame myself for
having made the first advances, although nothing came of it
except that he growled. I met him in a Cornish village in a
house where I stayed. There was a nice kennel there, painted
green, with a bed of clean straw and an empty plate which had
contained his dinner, but on peeping in I saw no dog. Next
day it was the same, and the next, and the day after that;
then I inquired about it - Was there a dog in that house or
not? Oh, yes, certainly there was: Jack, but a very
independent sort of dog. On most days he looked in, ate his
dinner and had a nap on his straw, but he was not what you
would call a home-keeping dog.
One day I found him in, and after we had looked for about a
minute at each other, I squatting before the kennel, he with
chin on paws pretending to be looking through me at something
beyond, I addressed a few kind words to him, which he received
with the before-mentioned growl. I pronounced him a surly
brute and went away. It was growl for growl. Nevertheless I
was well pleased at having escaped the consequences in
speaking kindly to him. I am not a "doggy" person nor even a
canophilist.
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