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CHAPTER VII 



OUR PUPPIES: AN ENDLESS SOUECE OF INTEREST AND 



AMUSEMENT 



Most puppy-rearers, I fancy, taking a lasting interest 

 in the animals they walk, and when good accounts 

 are received from the kennels of the performances 

 of their former charges the news is hailed with satis- 

 faction, and a kind of reflected glory plays round the 

 head of the puppy-walker. It was sad news, there- 

 fore, to hear one morning of the death of Carlow 

 Pitiful, a bitch reared here that had proved herself 

 about the best of the year's entry. Poor Pitiful ! 

 What an interest we took in her, wondering if that 

 heavy forehand would ever fine to a symmetrical 

 appearance, if that very crooked foreleg would ever 

 become more like its fellow ! Well, she grew, and 

 the chest seemed to narrow as she grew, the neck 

 to lengthen, the " neck-cloth " to drop o£P, and the 

 shoulders to fall back; while, if not exactly straight, 

 she did not stand so very much amiss after all when 

 she went in from quarters. We had no companion 

 for her in those days of extreme youth, for that year 

 we did not receive our usual couple of whelps. She 

 came alone, yet did not develop half the talent for 



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