THE FRIEND OF MAN 141 



until he gains admittance, when he comes in full of virtue 

 at having done his duty. 



For it must be yielded that the dog's self-righteousness 

 is detestable. They are the Gehazi's of beast-life, and 

 invariably say obtrusively, "Thy servant went no whither," 

 when any of their fellows happen to get into trouble. 



There is yet another evil trait in dogs — one which, 

 paradoxically enough, cannot be reckoned with too severely, 

 but which is nevertheless ridiculously over-estimated. 



It is their faculty for imparting to man what is quite the 

 most alarming of diseases in the world — hydrophobia. 



Terrible as it is, however, we must remember its 

 exceeding rarity at all times, and its almost total extinction 

 in late years owing to stringent laws. Whether those laws, 

 having now accomplished their aim, should be made still 

 more rigid (as they have been), or should be relaxed, as 

 many wish them to be, is ground for debate amongst par- 

 tisans. But the outsider, viewing all disease as equal evils, 

 remains lost in wonder why the half per cent, of a dog- 

 developed death should set all the machinery of law and 

 order in motion, while the untold mortality of another 

 disease which is man's gift to himself, and which belongs 

 so entirely to human life and human conditions that it 

 cannot, by any means, be communicated to the beasts, 

 should go unchecked. 



Charity does not in all cases begin at home ; certainly 

 it does not do so here. 



If, in the opinion then, of those who have followed 

 this record so far, the beasts seem to have but a poor case 

 on most points, there can be no doubt that they have done 

 less harm to man than man has done to himself. 



