t farmer, who, when asked his dog's
age, touched the old creature's head, and answered thus: "Teresa" (his
daughter) "was born in November, and this one in August." That sheep dog
had seen eighteen years when the great white day came for him, and his
spirit passed away up, to cling with the wood-smoke round the dark
rafters of the kitchen where he had lain so vast a time beside his
master's boots. No, no! If a man does not soon pass beyond the thought
"By what shall this dog profit me?" into the large state of simple
gladness to be with dog, he shall never know the very essence of that
companion ship which depends not on the points of dog, but on some
strange and subtle mingling of mute spirits. For it is by muteness that
a dog becomes for one so utterly beyond value; with him one is at peace,
where words play no torturing tricks. When he just sits, loving, and
knows that he is being loved, those are the moments that I think are
precious to a dog; when, with his adoring soul coming through his eyes,
he feels that you are really thinking of him. But he is touchingly
tolerant of one's other occupations. The subject of these memories
always knew when one was too absorbed in work to be so close to him as he
thought proper; yet he never tried to hinder or distract, or asked for
attention. It dinged his mood, of course, so that the red under his eyes
and the folds of his crumply cheeks--which seemed to speak of a touch of
bloodhound introduced a long way back into his breeding--drew deeper and
more manifest. If he could have spoken at such times, he would have
said: "I have been a long time alone, and I cannot always be asleep; but
you know best, and I must not criticise."

He did not at all mind one's being absorbed in other humans; he seemed to
enjoy the sounds of conversation lifting round him, and to know when they
were sensible. He could not, for instance, stand actors or actresses
giving readings of their parts, perceiving at once that the same had no
connection with the minds and real feelings of the speakers; and, having
wandered a little to show his disapproval, he would go to the door and
stare at it till it opened and let him out. Once or twice, it is true,
when an actor of large voice was declaiming an emotional passage, he so
far relented as to go up to him and pant in his face. Music, too, made
him restless, inclined to sigh, and to ask questions. Sometimes, at its
first sound, he would cross to the w