OUR DOGS. 



III. 



AFTER the sad fate of Rover, there came a long in- 

 terval in which we had no dog. Our hearts were too 

 sore to want another. His collar, tied with black crape, 

 hung under a pretty engraving of Landseer's, called " My 

 Dog," which we used to fancy to be an exact resemblance 

 of our pet. 



The children were some of them grown up and gone to 

 school, or scattered about the world. If ever the question 

 of another dog was agitated, papa cut it short with, " I 

 won't have another ; I won't be made to feel again as I 

 did about Rover." But somehow Mr. Charley the younger 

 got his eye on a promising litter of puppies, and at last 

 he begged papa into consenting that he might have one 

 of them. 



It was a little black mongrel, of no particular race or 

 breed, a mere common cur, without any pretensions to 

 family, but the best-natured, jolliest little low-bred pup that 

 ever boy had for a playmate. To be sure, he had the 

 usual puppy sins ; he would run away with papa's slippers, 

 and boots, and stockings ; he would be under everybody's 

 feet, at the most inconvenient moment ; he chewed up a 

 hearth-broom or two, and pulled one of Charley's caps to 

 pieces in the night, with an industry worthy of a better 



