The Wit of the Wild 



r 



how many assumptions it contains, and espe- 

 cially how supposititious is the conclusion. There 

 is no evidence that it was not an accident. Ter- 

 riers often fall from windows and sometimes 

 jump from them. Only a short time ago a dog 

 sprang from a lofty window-sill in New York 

 in an attempt to catch a bird ; it either did not 

 know, or more probably forgot, the peril of the 

 leap. My own dog, the first time it was taken 

 in a boat upon a lake, stood on the prow of the 

 boat a while and then deliberately sprang over- 

 board, where it was immensely surprised and 

 alarmed to find itself struggling in deep water : 

 all the water it knew about previously was very 

 shallow. 



Had not the circumstances of both these last- 

 mentioned cases been known, and especially had 

 they been associated with deaths in the families, 

 or something else remarkable, they might well 

 have been adduced as examples of conscious self- 

 destruction. 



A correspondent of The Field some time ago 

 gave a long account of how a terrier between re- 

 peated attacks of " fits," first dashed himself 

 ^202 5 



