lug hat to a skating-rink--and there his eye
stays like it was chained with a trace-chain. Now, I'll tell you what
I'll do with--"

I suddenly informed him in a peremptory tone that nothing would induce
me to purchase a dog at that moment, and then I pushed him out and
shut the door. When he was gone, I went across the street to see
Butterwick about top-dressing my grassplot. He was out, and I sat down
on the porch chair to wait for him. A second later the proprietor of
the dog came shuffling through the gate with the dog at his heels.
When he reached the porch, he said, not recognizing me,

"I say, pardner, the man across the street there told me you wanted a
good watch-dog, and I came right over with this splendid animal. Look
at him! Never saw such an eye as that in a dog, now, did you? Well,
now, when this dog fixes that eye on anything, it remains. There it
stays. Earthquakes, or fires, or torchlight processions, or bones, or
nothing, can induce him to move. Therefore, what I say is that I offer
you that dog for--"

[Illustration: A DOG FOR SALE]

Then I got up in silence and walked deliberately out into the street,
and left the man standing there. As I reached the sidewalk I saw
Butterwick going into Col. Coffin's office. I went over after him,
while the man with the dog went in the opposite direction. Butterwick
was in the back office; and as the front room was empty, I sat down
in a chair until he got through with Coffin and came out. In a few
minutes there was a rap at the door. I said,

"Come in!"

The door slowly opened, and a dog crept in. Then the man appeared. He
didn't seem to know me. He said,

"I say, old pardy--I dunno your right name--I'm trying to sell a
watch-dog; that one there; and I thought maybe you might be hungry to
get a valuable animal who can watch the head off of any other dog in
this yer county, so I concluded to call and throw him away for the
ridic'lous sum of--"

"I wouldn't have him at any price."

"What! don't want him? Don't want a dog with an eye like a two-inch
auger, that'll sit and watch a thing for forty years if you'll tell
him to? Don't want a dog like that?"

"Certainly I don't".

"Well, this _is_ singular. There don't appear to be a demand for
watch-dogs in this place, now, does there? You're the fourth man I've
tackled about him. You really don't want him?"

"Of course not."

"Don't want any kind of a dog--not even a litter of good pups or a
poodle?"