“All the folks around here,” she frankly said, “will be sorry to hear it; you ain’t like anybody else we’ve ever had in this town, at least sence I can remember. Father and Tom, and all the rest of ’em that’s been watching of you, say you care more for critters than you do for human folks, and I think so too; ever sence I heard you talk to that dog of yourn I couldn’t make you out. We never had anything like that up here before, and one of the store fellers told me yesterday he thought you were one of them New York City chaps a little off, that had come on this ride for your health, and yit you talk sense about anything else except them critters of yourn, and that’s what puzzles the folks—to think that such a smart feller as you ’pear to be, should be clear gone off when you get to talking to the critters. And then there ain’t any sense in it, any way; you can talk to dogs and hosses all your life and never git an answer. They are dumb beasts, that’s all they be, and you can’t make ’em folks if you try a thousand years. I’ll bet anything you ain’t got a wife. If you had, you wouldn’t be talking all this nonsense to critters all the time; if you had one worth a cent, you’d stay to home and talk to her, and let the critters take care of themselves, same as other folks do. Nothing like a good wife to take such wrinkles out of a man’s head! Why don’t you get married anyway? Right here in this town there are a lot of first-rate girls, better educated than I be, been to the high-school, and got as good learning as any of the city women, all dying to git married, and you can take your choice right here now. If you had one of our nice girls you wouldn’t need to have that darn fool of a dog round all the time for company.”
The latter part of this mind-freeing was earnest and emphatic, and I discovered between the spoken lines the true cause of the outburst. It was as clear as the noonday sun that she had a very poor opinion of an individual who preferred the company of a dog to the fascinations of fair woman, and she had made up her mind to let me know what she thought.
I ignored the nice girl part of the argument, and startled her by asking if she were a Christian. “’Spose I am, I try to be. I don’t know much about it anyhow. What makes you ask such an all-fired silly question? All the folks round here are Christians; we ain’t heathens any mor’n city folks.”
“Then it follows as a matter of course, you being a Christian, that you believe the Creator made Heavens and the earth and all things therein, and you do not believe he made anything in vain. All of his creations we see or know anything of were made for a purpose. The domestic animals were intended for the use of human beings, and upon the list of those the horse stands first, because he is the most intelligent of the purely useful animals; but the dog is far ahead of him in every respect save physical power. His intelligence is of a high order, which entitles him to our respect, and he is the only animal that will leave his kind to associate with man; and there are thousands of instances recorded of his having sacrificed his life for those he loved. No other animal has ever been known to do that. The elephant, with his admitted capacity for acute reasoning, never defends his master unless ordered; on the contrary, he seldom misses an opportunity to kill those who have injured or offended him. The dog never does this; he bears no malice, and forgets and forgives injuries inflicted by those he loves, neither does he know distinction of condition or rank. He knows you are his master or mistress, and whether you are prince or peasant it matters not. The palace or the garret are the same to him, provided a kind master is to be found in either, and he shares with his master the feast or the crust with equal pleasure. The noble dog possesses the highest qualities. He gives you his loyal affection without reserve, never deceives you, and is true even unto death, and I hold we are indebted to him for giving us all that is good in his nature, for, the better you treat him, the more his fine qualities come to the surface. Am I not right?”
“Well, I swan; you’ve taken the breath all out of my body; I never heard such talk before. I don’t know what to say, and I can’t dispute you. You’ve got the whole thing by heart and let it out just like one of them revival exhorters that comes along here every once in a while. You’ve said a lot about animals I never heard before or thought of; nobody round here ever talks about ’em like you do. Why, you put the dog way up head of folks. From what you say, he’s ten times as decent as most men, and, if he could only talk, he would show us he could spell hard words and do the meanest sums in the ’rithmetic. At any rate, if dogs and horses and other sich like are as smart as you say they are, they ain’t got no feelings like we have—ain’t got sense enough to be sensitive and take on about pain and suffering like we do. You can’t make me b’leve any sich stuff as that anyhow.”
This is the point usually made by those who have never seriously considered the true nature and physical structure of animals. A cursory examination would prove to the most careless observer, that the organs and various parts of the human organization are duplicated in the animals, especially in those of the domestic sort. The two points of difference are in form of body and the four legs given to the lower orders instead of two. The heart, lungs, bones, muscles, nerves, blood-vessels and brain are in each about the same. In the animal, for want of speech, the power of the brain is an unknown quantity, and the absence of that faculty of giving expression to thought constitutes the greatest difference between the species. Give the higher of the lower animals the power of speech, and possibly some men would take rank as the lower animal.
All this I explained to my audience of one, and, in addition, asserted that a cruel punishment of a physical nature inflicted upon a human being, if bestowed upon a dog, a horse or an ox would produce the same amount of pain and suffering. If whipping is painless, why do all animals who have once been whipped jump aside and try to dodge the whip they see flourishing in the hands of those near them? The answer is, fear of pain. There is no other explanation of their action. Schoolboys dread the birch and ferule of the schoolmaster no more than a horse or an ox fears and dreads the whip of a driver.
“I declare this is all news to me,” my rural friend replied, “and you really have set me to thinking. I guess we ought to treat all sorts of animals, including the human, better than we do. I’ve been going to meeting sence I was old enough to go alone, and I never heard a minister say anything about loving animals and treating them decently—kinder like folks—do a lot of good if they did—’spose they think they ain’t paid for that sort of business and ’ave got all they can do to save the souls of sinners.”
This was the last attempt at pure missionary work in behalf of the lower orders. The pleasure part of the excursion was about to end, and on the morning of the morrow the business of returning to the starting point was to commence in earnest. The return was made by a short series of long days’ work, commencing early in the morning, running well into the day, with rest in the middle, starting off again late in the afternoon, and extending well into the evening. In three days the return was finished, the whole excursion had lasted nearly three weeks—three joyous weeks, never again to be duplicated.
The most pleasurable hours of the little tour came from the association with my four-footed servants and companions. The gradual unfolding of their intelligence and the rapid development of their affection were never-failing sources of pleasure. Towards the last my calico horse would leave his feed, no matter how fascinating to his taste the oats might be, to be in my society, and the watchful dog was never away from my side, night or day. At first he shared the stable with his companion, but soon after, whenever he was ordered out for the night, his anxious, silent pleadings became so tender and touching that I could not withstand them, and I consented to his sharing my room with me. At first he had the natural dog habit of rising at an inconveniently early hour, but after being admonished of the irregularity of his behavior, he would remain quiet until ordered out for his morning exercise.