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A strange dog twenty-five miles from any place in which a dog would naturally be. Furthermore, when the animal was near enough to be seen distinctly, he furnished another surprise. He was entirely unlike any of the dogs of that neighborhood the hounds, collies, or terriers. He was white, short, chunky.
He had taken less approving note of the three guardian collies: Lad, still magnificent and formidable, in spite of his weight of years; Bruce, gloriously beautiful and stately and aloof; young Wolf, with the fire and fierce agility of a tiger-cat. All three had watched him, grimly. None had offered the slightest move to make friends with the smooth-spoken visitor.
But most of the pets had been native dogs collies, spaniels and terriers, and animals of mixed breeds and of no breed at all, but just good dogs. No one knew when the custom began, but there was an old and well-filled cemetery for the Castle pets. When a dog died a little stone was set up, with the name of the animal and the regiment to which it had belonged on it.
Ignoring the panic-struck woman on the bank, he flashed past her and galloped, body-deep, into the water; toward the swaying canoe. Here he paused. For Lad was anything but a fool. And, like other wise collies, he had sense enough to realize that a swimming dog is one of the most helpless creatures in the universe; when it comes to self-defense.
And leave poor little Simon Cameron alone! Aren't you ashamed?" Now, Bobby was not in the least ashamed except for his failure to reach his elusive prey. But, like many highbred and highstrung collies, he did not fancy having his collar seized by a stranger. He did not resent the act with snarls and a show of teeth, as in the case of the beach comber.
It seemed as if the day would never come. Presently across the intervale he caught the faint tinkle of herd-bells. Over the brim of rolling green just ahead of him came the flock, Sandy leading them, and the collies nipping at their heels. The herder strode rapidly forward, waving his sombrero as he came. Donald ran to meet him.
Sandy used no unnecessary words, but what he did say was crisp and to the point, and the herders liked it. They liked, too, to watch his face when his lips parted and his glistening white teeth gleamed between them. Sandy had a very contagious smile. He worked tirelessly, and ever as he moved about among the sheep two great Scotch collies tagged at his heels.
How I wished for the collies from the ranch! At a word they would have circled this little bunch and driven it straight down to me; and then it flashed into my mind that Nobs had run with those collies all one summer, that he had gone down to the pasture with them after the cows every evening and done his part in driving them back to the milking-barn, and had done it intelligently; but Nobs had never done the thing alone, and it had been a year since he had done it at all.
There are plenty of times when the wireless can't be used for sending messages from one point to another, and where there is no telephone connection, and where the firing is too hot for a human courier to get through. That is where is the war dogs have proved their weight in radium. Collies, mostly. There are a million true stories of their prowess told, at camp-fires.
Departing spirits, they believed, followed the sun into the west. Gods visited mortals though usually in invisible forms and were fond of the flesh of enemies slain in battle. Fetich and superstition took a hundred phases. Their gusty and savage minds were childishly susceptible and in their quickly roused affections they were as demonstrative as collies.
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