"Mr. Towser Dog is another good friend to all of us. He thinks very much of Mr. Man and his boy Teddy; but at the same time he looks after all the animals and birds on the farm. I've got a piece of poetry about him that perhaps you'd like to hear?"
"Who wrote it, Mrs. Goose?" your Aunt Amy asked, and Mr. Gander spoke up quickly: "That's what none of us know; but Mr. Crow said he had nothing whatever to do with it. He don't like Mr. Towser Dog, on account of some trouble the two of them had about Mr. Crow's digging up the corn just after Mr. Man had planted it. Hello! there comes Mr. Donkey, and now you may be sure Teddy Boy won't worry Mrs. Cow's baby for quite a while."
As Mr. Gander spoke a small, friendly looking donkey trotted up to where the dog and the calf were talking together, and old Mr. Gander seemed to think it necessary he should waddle over to hear what might be said.
"They'll spend a good half hour talking matters over," Mrs. Goose said as if displeased because of what she evidently believed was a waste of time. "If you want to hear the verses about Mr. Towser, I may as well read them to you now," and she drew out from beneath her wing a much soiled piece of paper, on which was printed the following lines:
He was just a common dog, you see,
With no particular line
Of ancestry to mark him out
As a well-bred creature fine.
He bayed at the moon as dogs do,
And vented his gruff bow-wows,
As he tagged my heels in the good old times
When we went after the cows.
He'd roll in the grass with the babies,
Or carry them on his back;
He'd catch the ball the youngsters tossed,
And follow the rabbit's track.
A boy's own dog, and a friendly
Companion in peace or rows,
As he tagged my heels in the good old times
When we went after the cows.
He could talk with a doggish lingo
In his own peculiar way,
And I could understand it all--
Whatever he had to say.
He'd jump to my call at the moment,
And utter his gruff bow-wows,
As he tagged my heels in the good old times
When we went after the cows.