Aileen Aroon, A Memoir Part 23

THE BLIND FIDDLER'S DOG.

The blind man's dog commences in doggerel verse:--

"It really is amusing to hear how some dogs brag, And walk about and swagger, with tails and ears a-wag,-- How they boast about their prizes and the shows they have been at, And their coats so crisp and curly, or bodies sleek and fat, Crying, There's no mistake about it, for judges all agree, We're the champion dogs of England, by points and pedigree."

Heigho! I wonder what I am, then. Let me consider, I am a poor blind fiddler's dog, to begin with; but of course that is only a trade. I asked "Bit-o'-Fun" the other day what breed I was. Bit-o'-Fun, I should tell you, is a champion greyhound, and not at all an unkind dog, only just a little haughty and proud, as becomes her exalted station in life.

She was talking about the large number of prizes she had won for her master at the various shows she had been at.

"What breed do you think I am?" I asked her. Bit-o'-Fun laughed.

"Well, little Fiddler," she replied, looking down at me with one eye, "I should say you were what we gentry call a mongrel."

"Is that something very nice?" I inquired. "Do I come of a high family, now?"

Bit-o'-Fun laughed now till the tears came into her eyes.

"Family!" she cried. "Yes, Fiddler, you have a deal of family in your blood--all families, in fact. You are partly Skye and partly bulldog, and partly collie and partly pug."

"Oh, stop!" I cried; "you will make me too proud."

But Bit-o'-Fun went on--

"Your head, Fiddler, is decidedly Scotch; your legs are Irish--awfully Irish; you are tulip-eared, ring-tailed, and your feather--"

"My feather!" I cried, looking round at my back. "You never mean to say I have got feathers."

"Your hair, then, goosie; feather is the technical term. Your feather is flat, decidedly flat. And, in fact, you're a most wonderful specimen altogether. That's your breed."

I never felt so proud in all my life before.

"And you're a great beauty, Bit-o'-Fun," I said; "but aren't your legs rather long for your body?"

"Oh, no!" replied Bit-o'-Fun; "there isn't a morsel too much daylight under me."

"And wouldn't you like to have a nice long coat like mine?"

"Well, no," said Bit-o'-Fun--"that is, yes, you know; but it wouldn't suit so well in running, you see. Look at my head, how it is formed to cleave the wind. Look at my tail, again; that is what I steer with."

"Oh! you're perfection itself, I know," said I. "Pray how many prizes have you taken?"

"Well," answered the greyhound, "I've had over fifty pound-pieces of beef-steak and from twenty to thirty half-pound."

"Do they give you beef-steak for prizes, then?" I asked.

"Oh dear no," replied she; "but it's like this: whenever I take a first prize my master gives me a one-pound piece of steak; if it's only a second prize I only get half a pound, and I always get a kiss besides."

"But supposing," I asked, "you took no prize?"

"A thing which never happened," said Bit-o'-Fun, rather proudly.

"But supposing?" I insisted.

"Oh, well," she answered, "instead of being kissed and _steaked_, I should be kicked and _Spratt-caked_, or sent to bed without my supper."

"And do you enjoy yourself at a show?" said I.

"Well, yes," said the greyhound; "all doggies don't, though, but I do.

And master gives me such jolly food beforehand, and grooms me every morning, and washes me--but that isn't nice, makes one shiver so--and then I have always such a nice bed to lie upon. Then I'm sent to the show town in a beautiful box, and men meet me at the station with a carriage. These men are sometimes very rough though, and talk angrily, and carry big whips, and smell horribly of bad beer and, worse, tobacco.

One struck me once over the head. Now, if I had been doing anything I wouldn't have minded; but I wasn't: only I served him out."

"What did you do?" said I.

"Why, just waited till I got a chance, then bit him through the leg. My master just came up at the same moment, or it might have been a dear bite to me."

"And what is a dog-show like?" I asked.

"Oh!" said Bit-o'-Fun, "when you enter the show-hall, there you see hundreds and hundreds of doggies all chained up on benches. And the noise they make, those that are new to it, is something awful. At first I used to suffer dreadfully with headaches, but I'm used to it now. But it is great fun to see and converse with so many pretty and intelligent dogs, I can tell you. It is this conversation that makes all the row, for perhaps you want to talk with a doggie quite at the other end of the hall, and so you have to roar until you are hoa.r.s.e. What do we speak about? Well, about our masters, and our points, and our food and exploits, and we abuse the judges, and wonder whether all the funny people we see have souls the same as we have, and so on. I have often thought what fun it would be if one of us were to break his chain some night, and let all the other doggies loose. Oh, wouldn't we have a ball just!

"Well, we are taken out in batches to be judged, and are led round and round in a ring, while two or three ugly men, with hooks in their hands and ribbons in their b.u.t.tonholes, shake their heads and examine us.

That is the time I look my proudest. I c.o.c.k my ears, straighten my tail, walk like a princess, and bow like a d.u.c.h.ess, for I know that the eyes of all the world are on me, and, more than that, my master's eyes.

And then when they hang the beautiful ticket around my neck, oh, ain't I glad just! But still I can't help feeling for the poor doggies who don't get any prize, they look so woe-begone and downhearted.

"But managers might do lots to make us more comfortable, by feeding us more regularly, and giving us better food and more water. Oh, I've often had my tongue hanging out, and feeling like a bit of sand-paper for want of a draught of pure water at a country show. And I've been at shows where they never gave us food, and no shelter from the scorching sun or the thunder-shower. Again, they ought to lead us all out occasionally, if only for five minutes, just to stretch our poor cramped legs. But they don't, and it is very cruel. Sometimes, too, the people tease us. I don't mind a pretty child patting me on the head, nor I don't object to a sweet young lady bending over me and letting her long silky curls fall over my shoulder; but there are gawky young men, who come round and prod us with their sticks; and silly old ladies, who p.r.i.c.k us with their parasols, and say, 'Get up, sir, and show yourself.'

You've heard of my friend 'Tell,' the champion Saint Bernard, I dare say. No? Oh, I forgot; of course you wouldn't. But, at any rate, one day a fat, podgy lady, vulgarly bedecked in satin and gold, goes up to Tell and points her splendid white parasol right at his chest. 'Get up,' says she, 'and show yourself.' Now Tell hasn't the best of tempers at any time. So he did get up, and quickly, too, and showed his teeth and bit; and if his chain hadn't been as short as his temper it would have been a sad thing for Mrs Podgy. As it was, he collared the parasol, and proceeded at once to turn it into toothpicks and rags, and what is more, too, he kept the pieces. So you see the life even of a show-dog has its drawbacks."

"How exceedingly interesting!" said I; "wouldn't I like to be a champion! Do you think now, Bit-o'-Fun, I would have any chance?"

"Well, you see," said Bit-o'-Fun, smiling in her pleasant way, "there isn't a cla.s.s at present for Castle Hill collies."

"What?" said I. "I thought you said a while ago I was a high-bred mongrel?"

"Yes, yes," said Bit-o'-Fun; "mongrel, or Castle Hill collie; it's all the same, you know."

"You're very learned, Bit-o'-Fun," I continued. "Now tell me this, what do they mean by judging by points?"

"Well, you see," replied Bit-o'-Fun, with a comical twinkle in her eye, "the judge goes round, and he says, 'We'll give this dog ten points for his head,' and sticks in ten pins; and so many for his tail, and sticks in so many pins in his tail, and his coat and legs, and so on, and does the same with the other dogs, and the dog who has most pins in him wins the prize. Do you understand?"

"Yes," I replied; "you put it as plain as a book. But it is queer, and I wouldn't like the pins; I'm sure I should bite."

"Ha! ha! ha!" roared "Bill," the butcher's bull-and-terrier. I knew it was he before I looked round, for he is a nasty vulgar thing, and sometimes he bites me. "Ha! ha! ha!" he laughed again. "Good-morning, Bit-o'-Fun. Whatever have you been telling that little fool of a Fiddler?"

They always call me Fiddler, after my dear master.

"About the shows," said Bit-o'-Fun.

"Why, you never mean to tell me, Fiddler, that you think of going to a show! Ha! ha! ha!"

"And suppose I did," I replied, a little riled, and I felt my hair beginning to stand up all along my back, "I dare say I would have as much chance as an ugly patch-eyed thing like you."