ling, closed
on them.

That flesh we had nursed from the first in all cleanness was given
To corruption unveiled and assailed by the malice of Heaven--
By the heart-shaking jests of Decay where it lolled on the wires--
To be blanched or gay-painted by fumes--to be cindered by fires--
To be senselessly tossed and retossed in stale mutilation
From crater to crater. For this we shall take expiation.
_But who shall return us our children_?

The Dog Hervey

(April 1914)

My friend Attley, who would give away his own head if you told him you
had lost yours, was giving away a six-months-old litter of Bettina's
pups, and half-a-dozen women were in raptures at the show on
Mittleham lawn.

We picked by lot. Mrs. Godfrey drew first choice; her married daughter,
second. I was third, but waived my right because I was already owned by
Malachi, Bettina's full brother, whom I had brought over in the car to
visit his nephews and nieces, and he would have slain them all if I had
taken home one. Milly, Mrs. Godfrey's younger daughter, pounced on my
rejection with squeals of delight, and Attley turned to a dark,
sallow-skinned, slack-mouthed girl, who had come over for tennis, and
invited her to pick. She put on a pince-nez that made her look like a
camel, knelt clumsily, for she was long from the hip to the knee,
breathed hard, and considered the last couple.

'I think I'd like that sandy-pied one,' she said.

'Oh, not him, Miss Sichliffe!' Attley cried. 'He was overlaid or had
sunstroke or something. They call him The Looney in the kennels.
Besides, he squints.'

'I think that's rather fetching,' she answered. Neither Malachi nor I
had ever seen a squinting dog before.

'That's chorea--St. Vitus's dance,' Mrs. Godfrey put in. 'He ought to
have been drowned.'

'But I like his cast of countenance,' the girl persisted.

'He doesn't look a good life,' I said, 'but perhaps he can be patched
up.' Miss Sichliffe turned crimson; I saw Mrs. Godfrey exchange a glance
with her married daughter, and knew I had said something which would
have to be lived down.

'Yes,' Miss Sichliffe went on, her voice shaking, 'he isn't a good life,
but perhaps I can--patch him up. Come here, sir.' The misshapen beast
lurched toward her, squinting down his own nose till he fell over his
own toes. Then, luckily, Bettina ran across the lawn and reminded
Malachi of their puppyhood. All that family are