Bashan and I

by Thomas Mann

A FEW ITEMS REGARDING BASHAN’S CHARACTER AND MANNER OF LIFE

A man in the Valley of the Isar had told me that dogs of this species might become obnoxious, for they were always anxious to be with the master. I was therefore warned against accepting the tenacious faithfulness which Bashan soon began to display towards me as all too personal in its origin. On the other hand, this made it easier for me to discourage it a little—in so far as this may, in self-defence, have been necessary. We have to deal here with a remote and long-derived patriarchal instinct of the dog which determines him—at least so far as the more manly, open-air loving breeds are concerned—to regard and honour the man, the head of the house and the family, as the master, the protector of the home, the lord, and to find the goal and meaning of his existence in a peculiar relationship of loyal vassal-friendship, and in the maintenance of a far greater spirit of independence towards the other members of the family. It was this spirit that Bashan manifested towards me from the very beginning. His eyes followed me about with a manly trustfulness shining in them. He seemed to be asking for commands which he might fulfil but which I chose not to give, since obedience was not one of his strong points. He clung to my heels with the visible conviction that his inseparability from me was something firmly rooted in the sacred nature of things.

It went without saying that in the family circle he would lie down only at my feet and never at any one else’s. It went equally without saying that in case I should separate from the others when out walking and pursue my own ways, he should join me and follow my footsteps. He also insisted upon my company when I was working, and when he chanced to find the door that gave upon the garden closed, he would come vaulting in through the window with startling suddenness, whereby a good deal of gravel would come rattling in upon the floor, and then with a sob and a sigh he would throw himself under my desk.

But there is a reverence which we pay to life and to living things which is too vigilant and keen not to be violated even by a dog’s presence when we feel the need of being alone, and it was then that Bashan always disturbed me in the most tangible fashion. He would step up to my chair, wag his tail, look at me with devouring glances, and keep up an incessant trampling. The slightest receptive or approving movement on my part would result in his climbing up on the arm-rests of the chair, and glueing himself against my chest, in order to force me to laugh by the air-kisses which he kept lunging in my direction. And then he would proceed to an investigation of the top of my desk, assuming, no doubt, that something edible was to be found there, since I was so often caught bending over it. And then his broad and hairy paws would smear or blur the wet ink of my manuscript.

Called sharply to account, he would lie down once more and fall asleep. But no sooner was he asleep than he would begin to dream, during which he would execute the movements of running with all his four feet stretched out, at the same time giving vent to a clear yet subdued ventriloquistic barking which sounded as if it came from another world. That this had a disturbing and distracting effect upon me need surprise no one, for, first of all, it was eerie, and then it stirred and burdened my conscience. This dream-life was all too clearly an artificial substitute for the real chase, the real hunt, and was prepared for him by his nature, because in his common life with me, the happiness of unrestrained movement in the open did not devolve upon him in that measure which his blood and his instincts demanded. This came home to me very strongly, but as it was not to be altered, it was necessary that my moral disquietude should be dispelled by an appeal to other and higher interests. This led me to affirm that he brought a great deal of mud into the room during bad weather, and moreover, that he tore the carpets with his claws. Hence, as a matter of principle, he was forbidden to remain in the house or to bear me company as long as I chanced to be in the house—even though occasional exceptions were made. He understood this law at once and submitted to the unnatural prohibition, since it was precisely this which expressed in itself the inscrutable will of the master and lord of the house.

For this remoteness from me, which often continues, especially in the winter, for the greater part of the day, is merely a matter of being away—no actual separation or lack of connection. He is no longer with me—by my orders—but then that is merely the carrying-out of an order, after all a kind of negative being-with-me, as he would say. As for any independent life which Bashan might lead without me during these hours—that is not to be thought of. Through the glass door of my study I see him disporting in a clumsy, uncle-like manner with the children on the small patch of grass in front of the house. But constantly he comes running up to the door, and as he cannot see me through the muslin curtain which stretches across the pane, he sniffs at the crack between door and jamb so as to assure himself of my presence, and then sits down on the steps with his back turned towards the room, mounting guard. From my writing-table I can also see him moving at a thoughtful trot between the old aspens on the elevated highway yonder. But such promenades are merely a tepid pastime devoid of pride, joy, and life. And it would be unutterably unthinkable that Bashan should take to devoting himself to the glorious pleasures of the chase upon his own account, even though no one would hinder him from doing this, and my presence, as will be shown later, would not be particularly favourable towards such an objective.

He begins to live only when I go forth—though, alas, he cannot always be said to begin life even then! For after I leave the house the question is whether I am going to turn towards the right, that is, down the avenue that leads into the open and to the solitude of our hunting-grounds, or towards the left in the direction of the tram station in order to ride to the city and into the great and spacious world. It is only in the first instance that Bashan finds that there is any sense in accompanying me. At first he joined me after I had chosen the great and spacious world, regarded with vast astonishment the car as it came thundering on, and, forcibly suppressing his shyness, made a blind and loyal jump upon the platform, directly amongst the passengers. But the storm of public indignation swept him off again, and so he resolved to go galloping alongside the roaring vehicle—which bore so little resemblance to the farm wagon between the wheels of which he had once trotted. Faithfully he kept step as long as this was possible, and his wind would no doubt have held out too. But being a son of the upland farm, he was lost in the traffic of the metropolis; he got between people’s legs, strange dogs made flank attacks upon him; a tumult of wild odours such as he had never before experienced, vexed and confused his senses; house-corners, impregnated with the essences of old adventures, lured him irresistibly. He remained behind, and though he once more overtook the wagon on rails, this proved to be a wrong one, even though it exactly resembled the right one. Bashan ran blindly in the wrong direction, lost himself more and more in the disconcerting strangeness of the world. And it was more than two days before he came home, starved and limping—to that last house along the river to which his master had also been sensible enough to return in the meantime.

This happened two or three times, then Bashan finally gave up accompanying me when I turned towards the left. He knows instantly what I intend to do as soon as I emerge from the doorway of the house—make a trip to the hunting-grounds or a trip to the great world. He jumps up from the door-mat upon which he has been awaiting my coming forth under the protecting arch of the entrance. He jumps up and at the same moment he sees what my intentions are. My clothing betrays these to him, the cane that I carry, also my attitude and expression, the cool and preoccupied look I give him, or the irritation and challenge in my eyes. He understands. Headlong he plunges down the steps and goes dancing before me in swift and sudden bounds and full of excitement towards the gate when my going forth seems to be certain. But when he beholds hope vanish, he subsides within himself, lays his ears close to his head and his eyes take on that expression of shy misery which is found in contrite sinners—that look which misfortune begets in the eyes of men and also of animals.

At times he is really unable to believe what he sees and knows, that it is all up and that there is no use hoping for a hunt. His desires have been too intense. He repudiates the signs and symbols—chooses not to see the city walking-stick, the careful citified clothes I am wearing. He pushes through the gate with me, switches around outside in a half turn, and seeks to draw me towards the right by starting to gallop in this direction and by turning his head towards me, forces himself to overlook the fateful No which I oppose to his efforts. He comes back when I actually do turn towards the left, accompanies me, snorting deeply, and ejaculating short, confused high notes which seem to arise from the tremendous tension in his interior, as I walk along the fence of the garden, and then he begins to jump back and forth over the pickets of the adjacent public park. These pickets are rather high, and he groans a little in his flight through the air out of fear lest he hurt himself. He makes these leaps impelled by a kind of desperate gaiety, scornful of all hard facts, and also to bribe me, to work upon my sympathies by his cleverness. For it is not yet quite impossible—however improbable it may seem—that I may nevertheless leave the city path at the end of the park, once more turn towards the left and lead him on to liberty—even if only by way of the slightly roundabout way to the post-box. This happens, it is true, but it happens only rarely. Once this hope has dissolved into empty air, Bashan settles down upon his haunches and lets me go my way.

There he sits now, in yokel-like, ungraceful attitude, in the very middle of the road, and stares after my retreating form, down the whole long vista. If I turn my head, he pricks up his ears, but does not follow me. Nor would he follow me if I should call or whistle—he knows this would all be to no purpose. Even from the very end of the avenue I can see him still sitting there, a small, dark, awkward shape in the middle of the highroad. A pang goes through my heart—I mount the tram with an uneasy conscience. He has waited so long and so patiently—and who does not know what torture waiting can be! His whole life is nothing but waiting—for the next walk in the open—and this waiting begins as soon as he has rested after his last run. During the night, too, he waits, for his slumbers are distributed throughout the entire twenty-four hours of the sun’s revolution, and many a siesta upon the smooth lawn, whilst the sun beats upon his coat, or behind the curtains of his hut, must help to shorten the bare and empty spaces of the day. His nocturnal rest is therefore dismembered and without unity. He is driven by blind impulses hither and thither in the darkness, through the yard and the garden—he runs from place to place—and waits. He waits for the recurrent visit of the local watchman with the lantern, the heavy thud of whose footfall he accompanies against his own better knowledge with a terrible burst of heralding barks. He waits for the paling of the heavens, the crowing of the cock in the near-by nursery-garden, the stir of the morning wind in the trees, and for the unlocking of the kitchen entrance, so that he may slip in and warm himself at the white-tiled range.