8 KRIDER'S SPORTING ANECDOTES. 



happy hunting grounds, when game was espe- 

 cially scarce in the terrestrial forests. In large 

 cities, where the dog is seldom called upon to 

 fight, or even die, for his master, with a whim- 

 sical degree of apprehension he is observant to 

 share in his every humor, whether it be to chase 

 strange cats in the garden, dive for stones in a 

 horse-bucket, point a partridge in a basket, or, 

 semper re composita, to take a strut with the dan- 

 dies on the sidewalk. But there is one thing 

 which he drops his tail against, and therein con- 

 sists his claim to gentility he has a soul above 

 work. Travellers may tell you long stories about 

 the dogs of Labrador and Newfoundland, and 

 even in our own land you may occasionally hear 

 of a butter churn, a small threshing machine, or 

 something of that sort, turned by dogs ; but take 

 our word for it, that in these very instances, 

 which they make so much noise about, the animal 

 is reduced from a state of humble companionship 

 to that of absolute slavery, and that every mo- 

 ment's labor eked out of him is through pure fear 

 of the lash. The sledge dogs, by their incessant 

 snarling and fighting in gears, sufficiently show 

 their abhorrence of the system; let but a wild 

 reindeer cross their path through the snow, and 

 off goes the entire pack in full chase, regardless 



