152 Next to the Ground 



ironic. Both had dead-black coats, crooked 

 fore legs, strong jaws, bluntish noses, stump 

 tails, and pure pale-green eyes. In spite of 

 the likeness Right was always wrong, and 

 Wrong as invariably right. Right the dog 

 had no brains whatever. He ran anything or 

 nothing, just as the notion took him, would 

 stand barking half a day beside a perfectly 

 sound stump, trying to make the world share 

 his belief that there was some wonderful beast 

 inside or under it, or if he ran a real rabbit, 

 followed it at an easy dilettante trot, his 

 mouth open, and yawping once in every ten 

 yards. A molehill was quite another matter — 

 he ran along it so fast and barking so furiously, 

 he sometimes stumbled over his own fore legs 

 and took a header that knocked the breath 

 out of him. Notwithstanding, Slow Pete, his 

 master, had faith to believe he would make a 

 great dog, when he had time to come to himself. 

 Since Right was rising two years old, Dan and 

 Little Moses laughed at the prediction. 



They scoffed at the bare mention of taking 

 Right possum-hunting. They did not really 

 need any other dog than Wrong, but since a 

 barking chorus is jollier of nights than a single 

 cry, they tolerated Daddy Jim's two dogs 

 Music and Damsel, who at least knew enough 

 to follow Wrong's lead. Music was a cur of 

 no degree. Damsel had a remote hound cross ; 



