But we've sported together
In all kinds of weather,
My little black feather and I."
It would be quite useless to lure him out with verse, and plain prose is equally ineffective when once he has made up his mind that he doesn't mean to move.
One more sign of old age there is, which I may briefly describe. He is always much agitated when his mistress packs her boxes to depart to an institution for higher education of which she is a member. While this is going forward, Soo-ti will not stir from her room except it be to couch in the passage outside. Thence he re-transfers himself to her room, and has been known, when the chief box is full of garments, to leap into it, to pad round in a circle three times, and to sink down with a sigh of satisfaction on what was once a very artistic bit of packing. I do not say that this trick is entirely due to old age. Nearly all dogs do it. Only there was on the last occasion a special anxiety, and a more than usual persistence and querulousness which seemed to say, "Don't go too far away, and come back soon, so that we may meet again before my eyes grow dim and my ears lose their keenness."
"In future all unmarried men and women having an income of $1,000 will be taxed by the city. Married men will not be taxed unless their income is over $1,500,000."—Canadian Gazette.
The poor fellows must have some compensation.