"And he led me over to the trough, where I lay down and kept perfectly still while he painted me into the picture. That picture now hangs in the National Gallery. It's called Evening on the Farm. Hundreds of people go to see it every year. But none of them know that the smart-looking dog sleeping beneath the watering trough is none other than myself—except the Doctor, whom I took in to see it one day when we were up in London, shopping.
"Well, now, as I told you, I had an idea in all this. I hoped that if I did something for George Morland perhaps I could get him to do something for me. But, of course, with him not knowing dog talk it was a bit difficult to make him understand. However, while he was packing up his painting things I disappeared for a while, just as though I was going away. Then I came rushing back to him in a great state of excitement, barking, trying to show him something was wrong and that I wanted him to follow me.
"'What's the matter, Jip?' said he. 'House on fire or something?'
"Then I barked some more and ran a little way in the direction of the town, looking back at him to show him I wanted him to come with me.
"'What ails the dog?' he murmured to himself. 'Can't be anybody drowning, because there's no river near.... Oh, all right, Jip, I'll come. Wait a second till I get these brushes cleaned.'
"Then I led him into the town. On the way there every once in a while he would say to himself: 'I wonder what can be the matter. Something's wrong, that's sure, or the dog wouldn't carry on so.'
"I took him down the main street of the town till we came to the place where the beggar had his pictures. And as soon as George saw the pictures he knew what was wrong.
"'Heaven preserve us!' he cried. 'What a dreadful exhibition! No wonder the dog was excited.'
"Well, it happened that as we came up the one-legged beggar, with his own dog beside him, was at work on a new drawing. He was sitting on the pavement, making a picture on canvas with a piece of chalk of a cat drinking milk. Now, my idea was that the great Morland—who, no matter what people say about him, was always a most kind-hearted man—should make some good pictures for the beggar to show, instead of the dreadful messes that he made himself. And my plan worked.