MY UNCLE'S BULL-DOG.

Evening Post, Volume XXXIX, Issue 68, 22 March 1890, Page 2 (Supplement)

MY UNCLE'S BULL-DOG.

My undo had abull-do~— a young j one — given to him by a friend. Tt was a grand dog, so his friend had told him ; all it -wanted, was training — it had not been properly trained. My uncle did not profess to know much about tho training of bulldogs, but it seemed a simple matter, bo he thanked the man and took his prize home at the end of a rope. " Have we got to live in the house with this?" asked my aunt, indignantly, coming into the room about an hour after the dog's advent, followed closely by the dog himself, wearing an idiotically self-satisfied air. "That!" exclaimed my uncle, in astonishment; " why, it's a splendid dog. His father was honourably mentioned only last year at the Aquarium." "Ah, well, all I can say is that liis son isn't going the way to get honourably mentioned in this neighbourhood," replied my aunt, with bitterness ; he's just finished killing poor Mrs. M'Slanger's cat, if you want to know what he has been doing. And a pretty row there'll bo about it, too." " Can't we hush it up?" said my uncle. " Hush it up !" retorted my aunt. " If you heard the row you wouldn't sit there and talk like a fool." " And, if you'll take my advice," added my aunt, "you'll sot to work on this ' training,' or whatever it is, that has got to bo done to the dog, hofore any human lifo is lost." My uncle was too busy to devoto j any time to tho clog for the next day or so, and all that could be done was to keep the animal carefully confined to the house. And a nice time wo had with him ! It was not that the animal was badhearted. He meant well; he tried to do his duty. What was wrong with him was that ho was too hardworking. He wanted to do too much. He started with an exaggerated and totally erroneous notion of his duties and responsibilities. His idea was that he had been brought into the house for the purpose of preventing any living human soul from coming near it, and of preventing any person who might by chance have managed to slip in from ever again leaving it. We endeavoured to induce him to take a less exalted view of his position, but in vain. That was the conception he had formed in his own mind concerning his earthly task, and that conception he insisted on living up to with what appeared to us to be unnecessary conscientiousness. Ho so flffoctally frightened away all the tradespeople that they at last refused to enter the gate. All that they would do was to bring their goods and drop them over the fence iuto the front garden, from where we had to go and fetch them as we wanted them. " I wish you'd run into the garden," my aunt would say to me— I was Stopping with them at tho time ' ' and Bee if you can find any sugar ; J think there's some under the big rosebush. If not, you'd better go to Jones' and order some." And, on tho cook's inquiring what she should get ready for lunch, my aunt would say, "Well, I'm suro, | Jane, I hardly know. What have j we? Are there any chops in the garden, or was it a bit of steak that I noticed on the lawn ?" On tho second afternoon the plumbers came to do a little job to tho kitchen boiler. The dog being engaged at the time iv front of tho house, driving away the postman, did not notice their arrival. He was broken-hearted at finding them there whenhe got downstairs, and evidently Warned himself most bitterly. Still, there they were, all owing to his carelessness, and tho only thing to i)o (lone now was to see that they did aot escape. There were three plumbers (it always takes throe plumbors to do a iob : the first mm comes on ahead ito tell you that tho second man will toe Jthere soon, the second ma« comes 4o say that ho can't stop, and the third roan follows to ask if tho first man has been there); and that faithful dumb animal kept them pinnod up in tho kitchen ! — fancy rwauting to keep plumbers in the ]hou«e longer than is absolutely necessary I—for1 — for live hours, until my uncle came home, and tho bill ran—" Self and two men engaged six hours, repairing boiler tap, 18a.; material, 2d. ; total, 18s. 2d." He took a dislike to the cook from the yery first. We did not blame him for this. She was a disagreeable old woman, and wo did not think much of h«r ourselves. But when it cume to keeping her out of the kitchen, so that the could not do her work, and my aunt and uncle had to cook the dinner themselyss, assisted .by the housemaid— a willing enough girl, but necessarily inexperienced— we felt that the woman was being subject to persecution. My uncle, after this, decided, that the dog's training must be no longer neglected. The man next door but .one always talked as if he knew a lot about sporting matters, aud to him any .uncle went for advice aa to how tto set .about it. "Ok, yes," said the man, cheer-, fully, " wry simple thing training a ; fcull-dog. Wants patience, that's 1 all." " Oh, that will bo ell right," said ray unclo ; "it can't want much more than liviug in the same houaa with him. How do you start ?" "Well. I'll toll you," sni.l tho next-door but-one. " You take him up into a room whero there's not much furniture, and you shut the door and bolt it." "I see," said my uncle. " Then you place him on tho floor in the middle of the room, and you go down on your kneos in front of him, and begin to irritate him." "Oh!" "Yes; and you go on irritating him until you have made him quite savage/ " Which, from what I know of the dog, won't take long," observed my uncle, thoughfully. " So much the better. Tho moraont he gets savage he will tly &i you." My u«/;le agreed that the jdoa seemed plausible. " Ho will &y at your throat," said the next-door-but-one man, "and this is where you will have io bo (careful. As he springs towards you, and before he gets hold of jrou, you must hit him a fair straight blow on his nose *nd knock him down." " Yea, I «cc what you mean." "Quite so— well, tho moment you have knocked him down he will jump .up and go for yow again! You ttiust knock him dowu Again, and xyou must keep on doing .t;WB until :the dog is thoroughly cowed $.^4 tfxuuwsted. Once ho ia thoroughly

cowed, the tiling's done; dog's as gimtle as a lamb after that." '• Oh," said my uncle, rising from his chair, "you think that a good way, do you '(" "Certainly," replied the next-door-but-one man ; "it never fails." "Oh, I wasn't doubting it," said my uncle; "only it just occurred to me that, aB you understand the knack of these things, perhaps you'd like to come in and try your hand on the dog ? We can give you a room quite to yourselves, and I'll undertake that nobody comes to interfere with you. And if — if," continued my uncle, with that kindly thoughtfulness which ever distinguished his treatment of others — " if, by any chance, you should miss hitting the dog at the proper critical moment, or if you should get, cowed and exhausted first, instead of the dog — why, I shall only be too glad to take the whole burden of the funeral expenses on my own shouldorH, and I hope you know me well enough to feel sure that the arrangements will be tasteful, and at the same time unostentatious." And out my uncle walked. My uncle gave the dog away soon after that. He gave him away as a wedding present to a near relation. — J. K. Jerome, in Murray's Magazine.