“Shook, and told him to go home, and get another gun.”
Gringo, of course, can leap like a cat, that being one of the characteristics of a thoroughbred bull-dog. He, however, can jump higher than most bull-dogs, for the man from whom Mr. Bonstone bought him had given him special training. He was a famous boxer, and Gringo says he used to put on gloves and have many a go with him. Gringo would spring at the boxer’s chest—he was a six-footer—and try to bite a button from his vest. The boxer would give him good blows with his gloves, and drive him away, but Gringo always came back. It was rough training, but it made the young dog hardy.
Besides the Frenchmen and Weary Winnie, the Bonstones have Yeggie, a mongrel, another one of the showman’s lot. Oh! what an eloquent looking little fellow he is. His eyes seem to be pleading with you to make up some message, that he is unable to deliver.
Amarilla says he is another one that got plenty of whacks from the showman. She says that look of tears in his eyes, means that he is trying to tell you of his troubles, so that you will sympathise with him.
All these show dogs have nightmare most horribly. That is one reason why Gringo won’t allow Weary Winnie to sleep in the house with him. He had her in one night, and he said that though he was fond of the creature, he couldn’t have her yelling blue murder every hour in his ear.
Yeggie is young and dashing, and hasn’t very good manners. He was a tramp dog when the showman got him, and sometimes he annoys me by saying that I, too, led a tramp’s life. I explain to him over and over again, that a wandering dog isn’t necessarily a tramp dog, but he can’t make the distinction. Poor fellow, he hadn’t early advantages, and is rather inelegant in his ways. We older dogs are always correcting him, but he forgets easily and is still very heedless. However, he has a very happy time, and that is the main thing. He loves the men and the horses, and always sleeps on the foot of Joe’s bed in his room over the larger of the two stables.
Thomas sleeps in the other stable, and Czarina is always his companion. She is a magnificent Russian wolfhound, and is Mrs. Bonstone’s special pet, next to Sir Walter, who is the favourite-in-chief, though he is not very much with his mistress now on account of his devotion to the hens.
I should have mentioned sooner this aristocratic dog. From the start, Sir Walter liked the idea of moving to the country, for it suggested his former life in Scotland.
Gringo and I imagined he would be the show-dog of the place—always in evidence on the avenue, in the drawing-room, on the verandas, or hanging about the automobiles.