Old lamps for new

by E. V. Lucas

The cat will turn away;

The Pekingese will please itself,

Whatever you may say.

For, to adapt an old proverb, where there’s a Pekingese there’s a will.

I do not think that she is ever likely to be a wonder from the point of view of the bench. At least one of the dreaded penalizations is hers already, and she may acquire others; nothing can make her fit to sit beside her illustrious grandfather, Ch. Chu’erh of Alderbourne, that Napoleon of Pekingese, that Meredith, that Brummell, all combined; nor has she the ingratiating pictorial charm of Ch. Broadoak Beetle; but no one knows what her own children may be like, and meanwhile she is enough for her owner. She has brought into a house hitherto unconscious of it the adorable piquancy of Peking.

Having done all that was possible to make Féng Hou our own, no one in the house having any independent will left, and butcher’s-bills rising like Grahame White: having done all this, it was something more than a shock to be favoured with a translation of the rhapsodical pearls of wisdom dropped from the lips of her Imperial Majesty Tzŭ Hsi, the late Dowager Empress of Western China, for the guidance of the master of her kennel. One saw at once how much was still to do if Féng Hou was to be worthy of her race. I quote this most delightful document, the very flower of Chinese solicitude and fancy.

Pearls Dropped from the Lips of Her Imperial Majesty, Tzŭ Hsi, Dowager Empress of the Flowery Land

Let the Lion Dog be small: let it wear the swelling cape of dignity around its neck: let it display the billowing standard of pomp above its back.

Let its face be black: let its fore legs be shaggy: let its forehead be straight and low, like unto the brow of an Imperial righteous harmony boxer.

Let its eyes be large and luminous: let its ears be set like the sails of a war-junk: let its nose be like that of the monkey god of the Hindus.