The Station Dogs Resented His Presence There, And Persecuted
Him As An Interloper; And Being A Peace-Loving Dog, Brown Bore It
Patiently For Two Days, Hoping, No Doubt, The Persecution Would Wear
Itself Out.
On the third day, however, he quietly changed his
tactics - for sometimes the only road to peace is through fighting - and,
accepting their challenge, took on the station dogs one by one in single
combat.
Only a full-sized particularly sturdy-looking fox-terrier against expert
cattle dogs; and yet no dog could stand against him. One by one he
closed with them, and one by one they went before him; and at the end of
a week he was "cock of the walk," and lay down to enjoy his well-earned
peace. His death-stroke was a flashing lunge, from a grip of a foreleg
to a sharp, grinding grip of the enemy's tongue. How he managed it was a
puzzle, but sooner or later he got his grip in, to let go at the piercing
yell of defeat that invariably followed. But Brown was a gentleman, not
a bully, and after each fight buried the hatchet, appearing to shake
hands with his late adversary. No doubt if he had had a tail he would
have wagged it, but Brown had been born with a large, perfectly round,
black spot, at the root of his tail, and his then owner, having an eye
for the picturesque, had removed his white tail entirely, even to its
last joint, to allow of no break in the spot; and when the spirit moved
Brown to wag a tail, a violent stirring of hairs in the centre of this
spot betrayed his desire to the world.
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