190 THE TIM BUNKEK PAPERS. 



always walks in a shaggy little dog, who listens with the 

 deepest attention, and the most solemn gravity, to all that is 

 said, and then when prayers are over, goes out again with 

 his friends. I can not witness that silent procedure, with 

 out being much moved by the sight. Ah ! my fellow 

 creature, this is something in which you have no part! 

 Made by the same hand, breathing the same air, and sus 

 tained like us by food and drink, you are witnessing an 

 act of ours which relates to interests that do not concern 

 you, and of which you have no idea. And so here we 

 are, you standing at the manger, old boy, and I sitting 

 upon it ; the mortal and the immortal close together ; 

 your nose on my knee, my paper on your head ; yet with 

 something between us, broader than the broad Atlantic. &quot; 



&quot; That is charmingly expressed, my dear,&quot; said Josiah, 

 &quot; and it satisfies the reason very well, but still the heart 

 pleads for its accustomed companionship in a better life. 

 It is a point not definitely settled by revelation, and as 

 the belief tends to make men humane in their treatment 

 of animals, I am inclined to think that there may be an 

 other life for them.&quot; 



Sally and Josiah had a good deal of discussion in this 

 vein, all very well in its pl&ce, but I could not take any 

 part in it. Sally, I guess, had the best of the argument, 

 but that did not make me feel the loss of old Rose any the 

 less. The tears from under the old spectacles at the other 

 end of the table were a little too much for me, and I had 

 to keep silence, or join the company of mourners outside. 

 Twenty-five years, you know, make a great hole in the 

 life of man, and when we are touchingly reminded that 

 they have gone, even though it be by the death of a brute, 

 it is very natural to think of the end. These domestic 

 animals, especially the most intelligent of them all, the 

 horse, have much to do with our moral training. The af 

 fection for them, which seems almost as natural and as 

 strong as for our own species, tends to repress cruelty, 



