Punch (57.1869)

76

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

[August 28, 1869.

A DISCERNING DOG.

Punch,—Everybody,
at this warm season
of indifference and
indolence, says to me,
" ConfouDd your poli-
tics." And I answer,
" Frustrate your kna-
vish tricks." But
politics being now
confounded by com-
mon consent, let me
—not to talk twaddle
—relate an uncom-
mon instance of
" Sagacity in a Dog."
It is not the sagacity,
observe, but the in-
stance which. I call
uncommon.

The dog which
afforded this instance
of sagacity is a Skye
terrier. I am bringing
an action for defama-
tion against a de-
tractor who has called

him a poodle. He (the dog, not the detractor) has been called a
blue Skye terrier, bat I call him slate-coloured, for that is what he is,
and I hate puns. Moreover, he has lost the hair of his tail and its
dorsal neighbourhood, which gives him a mangy and not a celestial
appearance.

He is accustomed to bark violently whenever there is a rap at the
street-door announcing anybody whom he does not know.

When he hears a rap that he is familiar with, the rap of any frequent
visitor, or person accustomed to come to the door, he also barks. But
then he barks sotto voce, his bark is a subdued wuh, uh, uh ! as much

He looks up from his paper for a second or so, vaguely, and after
answering, " that he doesn't precisely know," resumes his perusal.

Happy Thought.—To express an opinion, so as to get him to differ
from me, and then the subject will have the benefit of a discussion.
I say, " 1 should think one ought to go dressed well, eh ? "

Rawlinson (without taking his attention from the Times) replies,
" Oh, yes, decidedly."

I don't know him sufficiently well to express my annoyance at his
selfishness in not going into the matter thoroughly with me. He i*
selfish, very. I took him to dine at my Club with me, in order that
on returning to his rooms together he might listen to me reading my
MS. aloud, as a sort of rehearsal for Popgood and Groolly, but he
picked up two friends on the road, and whispering to me, " You'd like
to know those fellows, one plays the piano very well," he brought
them in, and they stayed in his and Willis's rooms, singing, play-
ing, and smoking until past three in the morning, and in fact I still
heard them roaring with laughter after I had gone to bed.

Rawlinson says, this morning, apologetically, that he 's sorry those
fellows stopped so confoundedly late, as he had missed hearing part of
my Typical Developments, which he had hoped I would have read to him.

I say, " Oh, it doesn't matter," but I shan't give a friend a dinner
at the Club again, in order to secure his attention afterwards.

He adds presently and still apologetically, that he should so much
have liked to have heard me read some of my best passages to him now,
after breakfast, if it hadn't been that he is obliged to go down to the-
Temple this morning.

As I should really like to try some of it before appearing before
Popgood and Groolly, I ask him at what time he must be at the
Temple, as there would be, probably, plenty of time for him to hear
something of it at all events.

Rawlinson looks at the clock, and says regretfully, " Ah, I'm
afraid I must be off immediately," and proceeds at once to look for his
umbrella and brush his hat.

Happy Thought.—To bring my MS. out of my bag and commence at
once on a passage with " What do you think of this ? "

Rawlinson has his hat on, and his hand on the door-handle. I
read, " On the various bearings of'Philological Ethnography on Typical'
Development. The assimilation of characteristics is perhaps from our

as to say, " I know who that is, but I bark just to say some one is ! present point of view one of the most interesting studies of the present
there ; never mind, it's of no consequence, only I can't help just barking, ! day." Mem. Must cut out the second " present;" tautology would

and so I bark."

So plainly does he bark to that effect, that I can always be sure that
the rap which he so barks at is that of some customary caller or other,
and can generally tell whom.

A man comes daily bringing fresh water from a neighbouring well.
I can always distinguish his rap by my dog's bark.

But the other morning, Sir, I made a mistake in interpreting that
peculiar utterance.

Wuh, uh, uh, barked my canine domestic, wuh, uh, uh, uh, uh!
There, thought I, is Noakes, the water-carrier.

It was the man who brings fluids of another description from the

quite knock over Popgood and Groolly.
Happy Thought.—Ask Rawlinson to lend me a pencil.
Very sorry he hasn't got one, I say "just stop a minute, while I
erase the word :" he looks at the clock again, and observes, he's afraid1
he must-

I tell him that listening to this passage won't take a second. " In
Central Africa the present—" very odd, another "present;" scratch it
out: only having scratched it out, the next word to it is " present "—
can't make it out at all. I pause and consider what 1 could have
meant. I ask Rawlinson to look at the word. What is it ? " Phea-
sants, I think," he says, " but I can't stop now: hope to hear good
public-house. i account of your interview with what's-his-name the publisher," and runs

Now here, Mr. Punch, is a story fit to be told by any nice youm
man for a small tea-party, to such a party, or to the larger kind^ of tea-
party formed by a meeting of the Temperance League, Band of Hope,
or United Kingdom Alliance. I think I may subscribe myself

Habitans in Humido.

P.S. My dog barks loudly at the grocer's man and the butcher's,
baker's, and greengrocer's. He barks gently at the Waterman, and—
the pot-boy.

MORE HAPPY THOUGHTS.

Willis not returned, so used his bed. I awake to the fact that it is
the day for Popgood and Groolly, and Typical Developments.

Rawlinson is down to breakfast about a quarter of an hour before
I am. He always will come down a quarter of an hour before I do,
and then he begins breakfast without telling me he is there—which is
unsociable, as I now know him well enough to tell him. Apparently
his object in being first at breakfast is to get hold of the Times, which
he keeps until five minutes before the boy calls for it (it is only hired)
and then asks me "If I'd like to see it," though, he adds, "there's
nothing particular in it this morning."

The important question to me now is how shall I appear before Pop-
good and Groolly ? I mean, how dressed ? I've never called on a
publisher, or a pair of publishers before, and the difficulty (I put it thus
to Rawlinson) is, should one be shabbily dressed to give them an idea
of poverty (starving author, children in attic, Grub Street, &c, &c, of
which one has heard so much) or should I go in the height of fashion,
so as to appear independent ? Rawlinson doesn't take his eyes off
the newspaper but smiles, and replies, " Ah, yes, that's the question."

Happy Thought.—To interest him personally, and get his advice by
saying, " What would you do, if you were in my position? "

out of the room.

Happy Thought.—Must really read this through quietly, and see it's
all right before going to Popgood and Groolly.

"In Central Africa the Present presents an aspect not remarkably
dissimilar from his brother of the American States." I see what L
meant: for " Present" read " Peasant," and the next word is a verb.

My eye soon gets accustomed to my own writing, after going care-
fully over several pages (there are a hundred and fifty-two in this MS.),,
and I determine upon going to Popgood and Groolly immediately.

Buy a pencil. Take a cab.

Happy Thought.—To appear (in the cab) opening and reading ml
MS., and correcting with pencil. Anyone passing, who knows me,
will point me out as up to my eyes in literary business. I wish I could
have a placard on the cab, with "Going to call on Popgood and
Groolly, the eminent publishers, with Typical Developments, Vol. I."
The result of the dressing question is that I am principally in black,
as if I had suddenly gone into half-mourning, or was going to fight
a duel with Popgood and Groolly.

Happy Thought.—W\g\i\, buy a pair of spectacles. Looks studious,
and adds ten years' worth of respectable age to the character. Perhaps
1 'd better not; as if they found me out afterwards, they'd think I'd
been making a fool of them.

We drive eastward, and pull up at the entrance of a narrow street
which has apparently no outlet. I pay him, and enter under an arch-
way. I feel very nervous, and inclined to be polite to everyone. My
MS. seems to me quite in character when in the neighbourhood of
Fleet Street, though I couldn't have walked up Regent Street with it
on any account. I think (encouragingly to myself) of Dr. Johnson,
and Goldsmith, and Mrs. Thrale, and Sir Joshua Reynolds, and
then of Smollett and Fielding, and lam saying to myself, "They
went to a publisher's for the first time once; " when I find myself
opposite a door on which is written " Popgood and Groolly." I