Jack, the Fire Dog

by Lily F. Wesselhoeft

Jack the Fire-Dog had, of course, known what was going on, and his heart was every bit as sad as the men’s.

“I suppose I’m a fool to feel so bad about it,” he confided to his friend Boxer, “but I can’t help it. We’ve been to a good many fires together, first and last, old Jim and I. My turn will come next, I suppose. I’m not so young as I once was, and old dogs are in the way.”

Such remarks as these had a most depressing effect upon his friend Boxer, for there is no dog more attached to his friends and more sympathetic than a bull-dog, although he is so reserved that he does not find it easy to express his feelings.

Boxer pondered over the situation, and the more he thought about it the more convinced he became that something must be done. He was on hand when the old engine-horse was taken away from the home that had been his for so long, and, as he looked at his friend Jack’s mournful face and heard him softly crying to himself, Boxer could bear it no longer.

“It is true that they will be sending him away next,” he muttered to himself; and as his indignation increased he cast his eyes about for something upon which to vent his anger. The man leading old Jim away caught his attention, and without stopping to consider the justice of his act, in true bull-dog fashion he rushed after them and seized the man by the leg of his trousers.

A commotion at once arose. Old Jim, startled at the sudden attack, started back, twitching the halter-rope out of the man’s hand, while the man struggled to free his leg from the bull-dog’s grip.

A bull-dog’s grip is a very peculiar thing. When he becomes excited, his jaws, which are very strong and formed differently from those of other dogs, become tightly locked. A spasm of the jaw seizes him, and it is impossible for him to unlock them himself until the spasm has passed. So Boxer held on, with his eyes set and his feet braced.

Now that old Jim was free, he stood still and looked on to see how the affair was coming out. He was not the only spectator, for quite a crowd collected at once. Varied was the advice given to make the bull-dog loose his grip, and poor Boxer would have been roughly handled had not Reordan seen the commotion and run to the spot. In a twinkling he had out a sulphur match, and, lighting it, held it as near the dog’s nose as he could without burning it.

The suffocating fumes of the sulphur match did their work, and Boxer gasped for breath. Thus his jaws were unlocked, and the man was freed. After such an excitement a dog always feels weak and shaky, and Boxer returned to his friend Jack with drooping tail and unsteady legs.