240 DOG STORIES 



talents which were highly cultivated. His 

 greatest pleasure, perhaps, was in an india 

 rubber ball, with which his gambols were 

 indescribably pretty and constant. It was a 

 great distress when he lost or mislaid his 

 ball, and he was miserable till he found it, 

 or another was brought him. It was a cruel 

 thing to say, when one of us went to town, 

 "Sprig, I will bring you a new ball," and as 

 sometimes happened, to forget to do so. On 

 return he would sniff about the person who 

 had gone, poke his nose into his or her 

 pockets, and if disappointed could hardly be 

 soothed, but would go away and have his 

 quiet cry to himself. Sometimes a kind 

 friend who knew him might bring him a new 

 ball ; but it very much depended on who 

 presented it whether it was accepted or not, 

 and I am afraid that too frequently for his 

 good manners he turned it over contemp- 

 tuously with his nose and left it for the old 

 one, which, gnawed, bitten, and broken, was 

 stiil the favourite. I used sometimes to 

 make a ball squeak by pressing the hole 

 against my hand, and I believe he thought 



