his departure, and persistently making its bed beneath his window, as if in tender tribute to the friend who drew Br'er Rabbit into the universal friendship. None can say, either, that some subtle chord of sympathy and relationship did not bring the strange, shy visitant in that supreme hour to a spot linked so closely with its tiny life. The unities of being, the tie that binds all living creatures, are but dimly guessed by us, and the mysteries of life lying all about us are deep and baffling enough to make the mystery of death not so very strange after all. Emerson's idea that the power that can manage the one can safely be trusted to take care of the other is the logic of the situation, and the good cheer of it is with him, too, when he adds: “I have seen what glories of climate, of summer mornings and evenings, of midnight sky; I have enjoyed the benefits of all the complex machinery of arts and civilization, and its results of comfort. The good power can easily provide me millions more as good." Physicians and scientists are struggling as never before to prolong man's days upon earth. Every week turns out sage treatises admonishing us to take care of all that we think-yea, even of wretched meat and drink -that we may continue in the land of the living. One thing makes them all valueless. They do not master the secret of perennial youth. Life without that is a thankless offering. Death as the way to it is a boon none would forego. The English writer speaks to the mark in declaring that it is age, not death, that this generation fears. No sane man would want to live 200 years, or even 100, dwelling upon the sordid animal affairs of eating and drinking, says an American writer who weighs the dietetic counsels. Better to have a church fall on him or some such kindly accident carry him off. Till youth and native vigor that set man free from these poor proddings of the flesh can come at science's call, the prolongation of his days holds little charm for him. Rather, his heart is with the poet, who prays: When the warp and woof are thinning, And the daylight is half blind, A CHAPTER ON DOGS AND THEIR SERVICE TO MANKIND H ERO DOGS" is a good name for a book, but it would a take a great many books to do justice to the subject. In all the volumes that have already been given to "man's best friend" the half has not been told. Writers find themselves swamped in an attempt to enumerate the instances of heroism which the dogs of any little town or neighborhood can furnish. The good woman who has lately organized a “Society of Hero Dogs" is likely to be overwhelmed by the company of eligible subjects. Scarcely a home can be found where some tale of fidelity or sacrifice on the part of the hero dog does not enter into its history or traditions, and more than the poor Indian finds it hard to dream of any heaven where his faithful dog shall not bear him company. From the dogs of the Zodiac to the three-headed dog of the Styx, there is no place so high or low in man's universe that the dog can not find entrance to it. Classic literature especially abounds in tributes to the dog, whether Ulysses or Alcibiades furnish the varying text. It was the famous epitaph of Lord Byron on his dog, Boatswain, however, that put the noble dog in his true place among earth's habitants. "Near this spot," wrote the poet, "are deposited the remains of one who possessed beauty without vanity, strength without insolence, courage without ferocity, and all the virtues of man without his vices. This praise, which would be unmeaning flattery if inscribed over human ashes, is but a just tribute to Botswain." Comparisons between man and the dog are commonly on the dog's side, and even hero worship shows a leaning in that direction that the "Society of Hero Dogs" but tardily recognizes. "I have known dogs and I have known school heroes that, set aside the fur, could hardly have been told apart," said Stevenson. Unquestionably if the refinement of heroism lies in giving one's life for another, no company of school heroes can match the army of faithful dogs that have given their lives for their masters or their boy playmates, to say nothing of those that have perished in the cause of science and exploration. It is quite to the mark that one writer exclaims, "Now that the hurrahing over polar expeditions is dying down, humane journals are pointing out that a portion of the praise bestowed upon North Pole explorers should be awarded to the unfortunate dogs, without whose services, given at a great cost of suffering to themselves, the attempt at pole searching would have been impossible." It is Nansen himself who gives the force to this position in the brief quotation from his book "Farthest North." For after admitting the horrible cruelty practiced upon these polar dogs, he says, "When I think of all those splendid animals, toiling for us without a murmur as long as they could move a muscle, never getting any thanks or so much as a kind word, daily writhing under the lash, I have moments of bitter self-reproach." It is Nansen, too, who points the fearful moral that such treatment of man's faithful friend carries. "It is a sad part of expeditions of this kind," he writes, "that one systematically kills all better feelings until only hard-hearted egoism remains." This is the more human side of the dog question which science and civilization are largely responsible for. When man roamed free through the glad early world regardless of poles or "world plaudits," his faithful dog served many of the purposes which the involved machinery of civilization have since made necessary, from pantries to scavengers. The Kentucky colonel who furnishes a late paragraph for the "wet and dry" columns preserves the traditions of those happy days. "He ate a breakfast every day," we are told, "which consisted of a nice juicy stake, a bottle of whisky and a dog. He had the dog eat the steak." The wandering Ulysses needed no pantry nor scavenger to care for the left-overs from his daily meal. The dog disposed of it all, and half the sani tation problems of to-day were done away with. It was when Alcibiades cut off his dog's tail to divert the unwelcome attentions of the Athenians from himself, that the more selfish and inhuman uses of his four-legged friend began to show themselves in man. The bobtailed curs and horses of the present day are a living commentary upon the heartlessness and ingratitude of the gay Athenian youth toward the splendid animal that had clung to him in patient watchfulness through many a bout that had put his human companions to flight. That they should cease to comment upon his crooked ways in turning their attention to his bobtailed dog was the brilliant excuse of the young poet and philosopher for the abuse of his famous pet. The amount of abuse that the dog will stand and cling still to a "miserable, thankless master" is a thing unparalleled in the whole world of sentient creatures, and that man has taken advantage of it in so many ways is one of the poorest things in all his history. Sometimes it comes from a lack of intelligence which the wonderful sagacity of the dog makes pitiful. But lately a beautiful shepherd dog came to his death through just such woeful stupidity on the part of man. For years he had been the pet and servant of a family living in the wooly West, where a watchdog's services were no |