Page:The Strand Magazine (Volume 3).djvu/135



HE dog is the friend of man. That is what I used to read in my spelling-book. I do not wish to impeach the authority of the spelling book, but I wish my neighbours hadn't so many friends.

All my neighbours have friends of this sort; some miscreants have several. It is obviously a conspiracy. I am a quiet man, as rule, but some day my neighbours will find that they have carried their persecution a little too far. I have made a careful calculation, taking into consideration all the dogs at present hereabout, and allowing a fair percentage for occasional visits; and as nearly as I can determine I find that the reinforcement of one mastiff, two retrievers, and a terrier, or their equivalent in lap-dogs, to the ranks of my neighbours' "friends," will just carry me past my limit of endurance. Then this terrace will be found reduced to a heap of ruins by the agency of nitro-glycerine. Of my own life I am reckless. Judge what it is worth to me when I describe, as calmly and dispassionately as my natural feelings will allow, the behaviour of some of my neighbours' dogs.

In speaking of my recent calculation, I expressed the result in mastiffs, terriers, and retrievers, simply alluding to their equivalent in lap-dogs, without stating that one lap-dog, as a weapon of offence, is the equal of two mastiffs and a very dirty mongrel. This is a mathematical equation which cost me some little trouble in the preparation, but I regard it with pride as trustworthy to the last decimal. In estimating the factors I had to consider the fact that what I may be pardoned for calling the entire cussedness of the lap-dog infects in a high degree its mistress and all about it. The Misses Pegram, next door on the right, keep two lap-dogs, a toy spaniel and a pug, which cause in me a constant change of opinion which in a mathematician is disagreeable. I always consider the spaniel absolutely the vilest creature in the animal kingdom until I meet the pug, than which I then decide nothing could be worse—until I see—or hear—the spaniel again; and so on. The Miss Pegram who owns the spaniel is one of the most implacable of my enemies. I deliberately assert that she chases me with that monkey-headed dog. I never venture out of doors but she bears down upon me—often from behind, so that I have no time to escape. She and the dog are connected by a length of ribbon, and it is their practice to manœuvre that ribbon between my legs if possible, and then wind it about me until I am upset, or until, in my efforts to escape, I tread upon