J. Earl Clauson

Boston Small, Maynard & Company Publishers

Copyright, 1916 By SMALL, MAYNARD & COMPANY (INCORPORATED)

TO THE MEMORY OF JACK, AN AIREDALE

PREFACE

Matthew Arnold, explaining why those were his most popular poems which dealt with his canine pets, Geist, Kaiser, and Max, said that while comparatively few loved poetry, nearly everyone loved dogs.

The literature of the Anglo-Saxon is rich in tributes to the dog, as becomes a race which beyond any other has understood and developed its four-footed companions. Canine heroes whose intelligence and faithfulness our prose writers have celebrated start to the memory in scores—Bill Sykes's white shadow, which refused to be separated from its master even by death; Rab, savagely devoted; the immortal Bob, "son of battle"—true souls all, with hardly a villain among them for artistic contrast. Even Red Wull, the killer, we admire for his courage and lealty.

Within these covers is a selection from a large body of dog verse. It is a selection made on the principle of human appeal. Dialect, and the poems of the earlier writers whose diction strikes oddly on our modern ears, have for the most part been omitted. The place of such classics as may be missed is filled by that vagrant verse which is often most truly the flower of inspiration.

PART I

PUPPYHOOD

[Pg 3]

THE DOG'S BOOK OF VERSE

WE MEET AT MORN

Hardwicke Drummond Rawnsley.

[Pg 5]

THE LOST PUPPY

Henry Firth Wood.

[Pg 8]

A LAUGH IN CHURCH

Anonymous.

[Pg 10]

TREASURES

Anonymous.

[Pg 11]

THAT THERE LONG DOG

Alice Gill Ferguson.

[Pg 12]

MY FRIEND

Anonymous.

[Pg 14]

TED

Maxine Anna Buck.

[Pg 16]

LITTLE LOST PUP

Anonymous.

[Pg 18]

MY BRINDLE BULL-TERRIER

Coletta Ryan.

[Pg 20]

LAUTH

Robert Burns.

[Pg 21]

THE DROWNED SPANIEL

Charles Tennyson Turner.

PART II

THE HUMAN RELATIONSHIP

"A man's dog stands by him in prosperity and in poverty, in health and in sickness. He will sleep on the cold ground, where the wintry winds blow and the snow drives fiercely, if only he can be near his master's side. He will kiss the hand that has no food to offer, he will lick the wounds and sores that come in encounter with the roughness of the world. When all other friends desert, he remains. When riches take wings, and reputation falls to pieces, he is as constant in his love as the sun in its journey through the heavens."

Senator George Graham Vest.

[Pg 25]

CLUNY

William Croswell Doane.

[Pg 26]

THE BEST FRIEND

Meribah Abbott.

[Pg 27]

MY DOG AND I

Alice J. Cleator.

[Pg 29]

MY GENTLEMAN

Anonymous.

[Pg 31]

THE DEAD BOY'S PORTRAIT AND HIS DOG

Gerald Massey.

[Pg 33]

ADVICE TO A DOG PAINTER

Jonathan Swift.

[Pg 34]

MERCY'S REWARD

Sir Edwin Arnold.

[Pg 37]

BEAU AND THE WATER LILY

William Cowper.

[Pg 39]

PETRONIUS

Frederic P. Ladd.

[Pg 40]

MY DOG

Joseph M. Anderson.

[Pg 42]

CHARITY'S EYE

William Rounseville Alger.

[Pg 44]

TO BLANCO

J.G. Holland.

[Pg 46]

THE OULD HOUND

Arthur Stringer.

[Pg 48]

THE MISER'S ONLY FRIEND

George Crabbe.

[Pg 51]

POOR DOG TRAY

Thomas Campbell.

[Pg 53]

MY COMFORTER

Anonymous.

[Pg 54]

THE LITTLE WHITE DOG

May Ellis Nichols.

[Pg 55]

THE IRISH GREYHOUND

Katherine Phillips.

[Pg 57]

THE VAGABONDS

J.T. Trowbridge.

[Pg 62]

IN CINEAM

Sir John Davies.

[Pg 63]

OLD MATTHEW'S DOG

Anonymous.

[Pg 67]

A DOG AND A MAN

Anonymous.

[Pg 68]

ROVER-DOG

Marie Louise Tompkins.

[Pg 70]

HORSE, DOG AND MAN

S.E. Kiser.

[Pg 73]

THE BEST DOG

Anonymous.

[Pg 75]

CÆSAR, KING EDWARD'S DOG

O. Middleton.

[Pg 76]

JUST OUR DOG

Anonymous.

[Pg 78]

RAGGED ROVER

Leslie Clare Manchester.

[Pg 80]

TO FLUSH, MY DOG

Elizabeth Barrett Browning.

[Pg 86]

FRANCES

Richard Wightman.

[Pg 88]

TO MY SETTER, SCOUT

Frank H. Selden.

[Pg 90]

WHY STRIK'ST THOU ME?

Nathan Haskell Dole (Translator).

[Pg 92]

CONSOLATION

Howard C. Kegley.

[Pg 93]

ARGUS

Alexander Pope.

[Pg 94]

CHAINED IN THE YARD

Anonymous.

[Pg 95]

WHY THE DOG'S NOSE IS COLD

Margaret Eytinge.

[Pg 97]

DOG LANGUAGE

Marion Hovey Briggs.

[Pg 98]

A DOG'S LOYALTY

Anonymous.

PART III

THE DOG IN ACTION

[Pg 101]

TOLD TO THE MISSIONARY

George R. Sims.

[Pg 106]

THE DOG OF THE LOUVRE

Ralph Cecil.

[Pg 109]

THE CHASE

Lord Somerville.

[Pg 111]

THE UNDER DOG

Anonymous.

[Pg 112]

THE SHEPHERD AND HIS DOG

William Lisle Bowles.

[Pg 113]

BETH GELERT

William Robert Spencer.

[Pg 117]

THE FLAG AND THE FAITHFUL

(A Washington woman has made a loud outcry to the Secretary of War to reprimand the soldiers at the Government Aviation Station for burying their faithful dog, Muggsie, wrapped in the Stars and Stripes.)

William J. Lampton.

[Pg 118]

A GUARDIAN AT THE GATE

John Clare.

[Pg 119]

A TALE OF THE REIGN OF TERROR

Caroline Bowles Southey.

[Pg 126]

AN ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF A MAD DOG

Oliver Goldsmith.

[Pg 128]

THE FUSILIERS' DOG

Francis Doyle.

[Pg 131]

FIDELITY

William Wordsworth.

[Pg 134]

THE SHEPHERD DOG OF THE PYRENEES

Ellen Murray.

[Pg 137]

THE DOG UNDER THE WAGON

Anonymous.

[Pg 139]

SAL'S TOWSER AND MY TROUSER

A RUSTIC IDYL BY A RUSTIC IDLER

Anonymous.

[Pg 141]

ROVER IN CHURCH

James Buckham.

PART IV

THE DOG'S HEREAFTER

[Pg 145]

BILLY

Lorenzo Sears.

[Pg 147]

THE BOND

George H. Nettle.

[Pg 148]

TO A DOG

Anonymous.

[Pg 150]

CANINE IMMORTALITY

Robert Southey.

[Pg 152]

A FRIENDLY WELCOME

Lord Byron.

[Pg 153]

EXEMPLARY NICK

Sydney Smith.

[Pg 154]

THE DIFFERENCE

Anonymous.

[Pg 155]

LADDIE

Katherine Lee Bates.

[Pg 157]

A DOG'S EPITAPH

Lord Byron.

[Pg 159]

THE PASSING OF A DOG

Anonymous.

[Pg 160]

MY DOG

Anonymous.

[Pg 161]

JACK

H.P.W.

[Pg 162]

IN MEMORY OF "DON"

M.S.W.

[Pg 164]

RODERICK DHU

Helen Fitzgerald Sanders.

[Pg 166]

QUESTIONS

William Hurrell Mallock.

[Pg 167]

HIS EPITAPH

William Watson.

[Pg 168]

IN MEMORIAM

Henry Willett.

[Pg 170]

QUESTIONS

Oliver Wendell Holmes.

[Pg 171]

OUR DOG JOCK

James Payn.

[Pg 172]

TORY, A PUPPY

Mortimer Collins.

[Pg 173]

ON AN IRISH RETRIEVER

Fanny Kemble Butler.

[Pg 174]

A RETRIEVER'S EPITAPH

Robert C. Lehmann.

THE END

Transcriber's note:

My dog and I: Author is Alice J. Chester in the Table of contents and Alice J. Cleator in the text.