NOTES
This article originally appeared in The English Illustrated Magazine for May 1883, Vol. I, pp. 300-305. It was accompanied with illustrations by Randolph Caldecott. The essay was later included in the volume Memories and Portraits (1887).
The astonishing fidelity and devotion of the dog to his master have certainly been in part repaid by men of letters in all times. A valuable essay might be written on the Dog's Place in Literature; in the poetry of the East, hundreds of years before Christ, the dog's faithfulness was more than once celebrated. One of the most marvellous passages in Homer's Odyssey is the recognition of the ragged Ulysses by the noble old dog, who dies of joy. In recent years, since the publication of Dr. John Brown's Rab and his Friends (1858), the dog has approached an apotheosis. Among innumerable sketches and stories with canine heroes may be mentioned Bret Harte's extraordinary portrait of Boonder: M. Maeterlinck's essay on dogs: Richard Harding Davis's The Bar Sinister: Jack London's The Call of the Wild: and best of all, Alfred Ollivant's splendid story Bob, Son of Battle (1898) which has every indication of becoming an English classic. It is a pity that dogs cannot read.
[Note 1: The morals of dog-kind. Stevenson discusses this subject again in his essay Pulvis et Umbra (1888).]
[Note 2: Who whet the knife of the vivisectionist or heat his oven. Stevenson was so sympathetic by nature that once, seeing a man beating a dog, he interfered, crying, "It's not your dog, it's God's dog." On the subject of vivisection, however his biographer says: "It must be laid to the credit of his reason and the firm balance of his judgment that although vivisection was a subject he could not endure even to have mentioned, yet, with all his imagination and sensibility, he never ranged himself among the opponents of this method of inquiry, provided, of course, it was limited, as in England, with the utmost rigour possible."—Balfour's Life, II, 217. The two most powerful opponents of vivisection among Stevenson's contemporaries were Ruskin and Browning. The former resigned the Professorship of Poetry at Oxford because vivisection was permitted at the University: and the latter in two poems Tray and Arcades Ambo treated the vivisectionists with contempt, implying that they were cowards. In Bernard Shaw's clever novel Cashel Byron's Profession, The prize-fighter maintains that his profession is more honorable than that of a man who bakes dogs in an oven. This novel, by the way, which he read in the winter of 1887-88, made an extraordinary impression on Stevenson; he recognised its author's originality and cleverness immediately, and was filled with curiosity as to what kind of person this Shaw might be. "Tell me more of the inimitable author," he cried. It is a pity that Stevenson did not live to see the vogue of Shaw as a dramatist, for the latter's early novels produced practically no impression on the public. See Stevenson's highly entertaining letter to William Archer, Letters, II, 107.]
[Note 3: "Trailing clouds of glory." Trailing with him clouds of glory. This passage, from Wordsworth's Ode on the Intimations of Immortality (1807), was a favorite one with Stevenson, and he quotes it several times in various essays.]
[Note 4: The leading distinction. Those who know dogs will fully agree with Stevenson here.]
[Note 5: The faults of the dog. All lovers of dogs will by no means agree with Stevenson in his enumeration of canine sins.]
[Note 6: Montaigne's "je ne sais quoi de généreux." A bit of generosity. Montaigne's Essays (1580) had an enormous influence on Stevenson, as they have had on nearly all literary men for three hundred years. See his article in this volume, Books Which Save Influenced Me, and the discussion of the "personal essay" in our general Introduction.]
[Note 7: Sir Willoughby Patterne. Again a character in Meredith's Egoist. See our Note 47 of Chapter IV above.]
[Note 8: Hans Christian Andersen. A Danish writer of prodigious popularity: born 1805, died 1875. His books were translated into many languages. The "memoirs" Stevenson refers to, were called The Story of My Life, in which the author brought the narrative only so far as 1847: it was, however, finished by another hand. He is well known to juvenile readers by his Stories for Children.]
[Note 9: Once he ceased hunting and became man's plate-licker, the Rubicon was crossed. For a reversion to type, where the plate-licker goes back to hunting, see Mr. London's powerful story, The Call of the Wild. … The "Rubicon" was a small stream separating Cisalpine Gaul from Italy. Caesar crossed it in 49 B. C, thus taking a decisive step in deliberately advancing into Italy. "Plutarch, in his life of Caesar, makes quite a dramatic scene out of the crossing of the Rubicon. Caesar does not even mention it."—B. Perrin's ed. of Caesar's Civil War, p. 142.]
[Note 10: The law in their members. Romans, VII, 23. "But I see another law in my members.">[
[Note 11: Sir Philip Sidney. The stainless Knight of Elizabeth's Court, born 1554, died 1586. The pages of history afford no better illustration of the "gentleman and the scholar." Poet, romancer, critic, courtier, soldier, his beautiful life was crowned by a noble death.]
[Note 12: The ideal of the dog is feudal and religious. Maeterlinck says the dog is the only being who has found and is absolutely sure of his God.]
[Note 13: Damnable and parlous than Corin's in the eyes of
Touchstone. See As You Like It, Act III, Sc. 2. "Sin is damnation:
Thou art in a parlous state, shepherd.">[
[Note 14: Cairn-gorms. Brown or yellow quartz, found in the mountain of Cairngorm, Scotland, over 4000 feet high. Stevenson's own dog, "Woggs" or "Bogue," was a black Skye terrier, whom the author seems here to have in mind. See Note 20 of this Chapter, below, "Woggs.">[
[Note 15: A Soul's Tragedy. The title of a tragedy by Browning, published in 1846.]
[Note 16: Troilus and Cressida. One of the most bitter and cynical plays ever written; practically never seen on the English stage, it was successfully revived at Berlin, in September 1904.]
[Note 17: "While the lamp holds on to burn … the greatest sinner may return." From a hymn by Isaac Watts (1674-1748), beginning
"Life is the time to serve the Lord,
The time to insure the great reward;
And while the lamp holds out to burn,
The vilest sinner may return."
Although this stanza has no remarkable merit, many of Watts's hymns are genuine poetry.]
[Note 18: Sturm und Drang. This German expression has been well translated "Storm and Stress." It was applied to the literature in Germany (and in Europe) the latter part of the XVIIIth century, which was characterised by emotional excess of all kinds. A typical book of the period was Goethe's Sorrows of Werther (Die Leiden des jungen Werthers, 1774). The expression is also often applied to the period of adolescence in the life of the individual.]
[Note 19: Jesuit confessors. The Jesuits, or Society of Jesus, one of the most famous religious orders of the Roman Catholic Church, was founded in 1534 by Ignatius of Loyola and a few others.]
[Note 20: Modified by Cheeryble. The Cheeryble Brothers are characters in Dickens's Nicholas Nickleby (1838-9). Dickens said in his Preface, "Those who take an interest in this tale, will be glad to learn that the BROTHERS CHEERYBLE live: that their liberal charity, their singleness of heart, their noble nature … are no creations of the Author's brain.">[
[Note 21: "Rake the backets." The "backet" is a small, square, wooden trough generally used for ashes and waste.]
[Note 22: Woggs (_and Note: Walter, Watty, Woggy, Woggs, Wog, and lastly Bogue; under which last name he fell in battle some twelve months ago. Glory was his aim and he attained it; for his icon, by the hand of Caldecott, now lies among the treasures of the nation.) Stevenson's well-beloved black Skye terrier. See Balfour's Life, I, 212, 223. Stevenson was so deeply affected by Woggs's death that he could not bear ever to own another dog. A Latin inscription was placed on his tombstone…. This Note was added in 1887, when the essay appeared in Memories and Portraits. "Icon" means image (cf. iconoclast); the word has lately become familiar through the religious use of icons by the Russians in the war with Japan. Randolph Caldecott (1846-1886) was a well-known artist and prominent contributor of sketches to illustrated magazines.]
[Note 23: "Stammering Professors." A "professor" here means simply a professing Christian. Stevenson alludes to the fact that dogs howl fearfully if some one in the house is dying.]
[Note 24: "Carneying." This means coaxing, wheedling.]
[Note 25: Louis Quatorze. Louis XIV of France, who died in 1715, after a reign of 72 years, the longest reign of any monarch in history. His absolutism and complete disregard of the people unconsciously prepared the way for the French Revolution in 1789.]