For example; look at that pack of dogs of all sizes, of all tastes, (I mean human,) and in every stage of canine civilization, which their masters permit to run at large in the streets of our city, even in the worst of the dog days, without counting the free and independent dogs who know no master but themselves. You have a friend who is a diligent reader of the chapter of accidents in the daily papers. He tells you about this or that dog who was seen running mad, that he had bitten two or three persons, one of whom has since died of hydrophobia, and adds with a peculiar relish that "the dangerous animal is still at large!" These gentlemen--I mean the owners of the dogs--are provokingly careless and indifferent about the muck which their dogs are running in the midst of a population biteable to any extent. You are kindly informed that if you happen to get bitten by some suspicious-looking cur--and what cur is not of a suspicious character in these days--it will be necessary to squeeze the wound, wash it, then cauterize it with a red hot iron, or cut it out, and then, etc., etc. These are most excellent recipes, I have no doubt, but I think I know of a better, which would be to prevent the bites altogether.
But, you say, there is the proclamation of his Honor, the Mayor, and there is the police, etc., etc. Dogs at large are to be muzzled or held by a chain. Oh! yes; very fine, indeed, when they are. The proclamation is very good, but since the dog owners pay so little heed to it, it is not surprising that the dogs themselves pay no more respect to it than they do to the proclamations of patent medicines pasted on the lamp-posts or fences. As to the country places outside of the city, whither we of the heated streets and close shops fly to get a breath of fresh air, and a moment of repose--there you will see fat men and thin ladies who never dream, either asleep or awake, of muzzling their favorite bull-dogs, lap-dogs, pointers, setters, tan terriers or greyhounds. Muzzle their dogs! that would make the poor dogs, and their owners too, very uncomfortable. A pretty piece of impudence indeed for a village constable to presume to carry out the law against the dog, errant in delicto, which is the property of a Mr. or a Mrs. or a Miss who is a "somebody," as if they were nobodies. Mr. Constable knows better than that, and so does Mr. Puffer, the magistrate.
Besides, there is a learned doctor of the society for the prevention, etc., who deplores with astonishment mingled with grief, etc., etc., that any one should be so inhumane as to gag "man's companion and friend" for the sake of the prevention of a few despicable cases of hydrophobia. He has never been bitten by a mad dog, and don't expect to be. He does not see why anybody else need expect to be.
Then there are our nurses and the children, whose daily promenade is embittered by the sight and often the attacks of some Snarleyow. "It was as good as a play," says Snarleyow's master; "Snarley nearly frightened them to death, I thought I should die of laughter to see them [{691}] scamper. It was great fun for Snarley." Very well, gentlemen, there is also something which is great fun for me too, and that is to kick Snarley whenever he presumes to be too "playful" with me or my particular friends the children.
Protect your "friends of man" if you will, gentlemen, but don't let them interfere with my friends, or---
III.
Permit me here to make a digression, which is not altogether one;
Man is defined, a reasonable animal.
Now the question arises whether woman is included in this definition. Don't get angry, ladies--the horrid men, you know, are so curious!
IV.