e quiet with her; and, even if one of them
sampled the leg of a guest with a view to further business, she would be
secretly pleased at such a proof of exclusive affection. We suppose that
people must have something to be fond of; but why should any one be
fond of a pug that is too unwieldy to move faster than a hedgehog? His
face is, to say the least, not celestial--whatever his nose may be; he
cannot catch a rat; he cannot swim; he cannot retrieve; he can do
nothing, and his insolence to strangers eclipses the best performances
of the finest and tallest Belgravian flunkeys. He is alive, and in his
youth he may doubtless have been comic and engaging; but in his obese,
waddling, ill-conditioned old age he is such an atrocity that one wishes
a wandering Chinaman might pick him up and use him instantly after the
sensible thrifty fashion of the great nation.

I love the St. Bernard; he is a noble creature, and his beautiful
life-saving instinct is such that I have seen a huge member of the breed
jump off a high bridge to save a puppy which he considered to be
drowning. The St. Bernard will allow a little child to lead him and to
smite him on the nose without his uttering so much as a whine by way of
remonstrance. If another dog attacks him, he will not retaliate by
biting--that would be undignified, and like a mere bull-dog; he lies
down on his antagonist and waits a little; then that other dog gets up
when it has recovered breath, and, after thinking the matter over, it
concludes that it must have attacked a sort of hairy traction-engine.
All these traits of the St. Bernard are very sweet and engaging, and I
must, moreover, congratulate him on his scientific method of treating
burglars; but I do object with all the pathos at my disposal to the St.
Bernard considered as a pet. His master will bring him into rooms. Now,
when he is bounding about on glaciers, or infringing the Licensing Act
by giving travellers brandy without scrutinizing their return-tickets,
or acting as pony for frozen little boys, or doing duty as special
constable when burglars pay an evening call, he is admirable; but, when
he enters a room, he has all the general effects of an earthquake
without any picturesque accessories. His beauty is of course praised,
and, like any other big lumbering male, he is flattered; his vast tail
makes a sweep like the blade of a screw-propeller, and away goes a vase.
A maid brings in tea, and the St. Bernard is pleased to