34 SIJi HI) WIN LAND SEER, R.A. 



apart from its merits as a work of art ; and these can scarcely outweigh the feeling of 

 pain such a scene must or ought to produce in the mind. 



"Jack in Office," engraved here, shows himself quite equal to the position to 

 which he has been elevated. The picture, which is at South Kensington, is one 

 of Landseer's comparatively early works, dating as far back as 1833, when it was 

 hung at the Academy ; but we may search the entire catalogue of his subsequent 

 productions to show anything more characteristic of dogology than this most humorous 

 and eloquent composition, for every animal discourses in its own appropriate language 

 as Nature, in accordance with her necessities or demands, prompts. First of all, there 

 is the "man in possession" — the "Jack in Office" — a strong-built, ill-tempered 

 mastiff, whose personal appearance evidences that he never knows the want of a meal ; 

 though his master possibly feeds him well, as much to prevent his robbing the barrows 

 as to get all the work out of him he can ; on the principle which an Italian writer of 

 about a quarter of a century ago ascribes to Englishmen, when he asserted that we 

 fed our servants and labourers on the best to enable them to work the more. The 

 owner of the dog has left his subordinate in charge of the meat-barrow while he 

 delivers some pennyworths of horseflesh to his customers ; or, perhaps, has betaken 

 himself to a public -house close at hand for refreshment. The over-fed creature 

 appears alive to his duty, and quite as ready to perform it. He sits and watches 

 the grpup around him with supreme contempt and indifference to their wants, like a 

 pampered menial ; and with manifest determination to repel any attack which might be 

 made on the savoury viands. The selfish and spoiled animal is but a type of a certain 

 class of human beings, who care little or nothing for others so long as they prosper 

 and have their own wants amply satisfied. There is a wholesome moral to be learned 

 from this representative dog. 



Any one who notices in the streets a vendor of cats' and dogs' meat will almost 

 invariably see him accompanied on his rounds by a train of followers, enticed by the 

 luxuries he has for sale. Here is a group, diverse in character as in kind ; but all 

 hungry, or pretending to be so. Foremost is a miserable, lank, half-starved hound, a 

 fitting candidate for some " home for the homeless," yet it is clear she has an owner, 

 one, possibly, as wretched and hungry as herself, for the broken cord round her neck 

 tells of her escape from some kind of domicile ; and no wonder, when you look at her 

 condition. She scans eagerly the tempting morsel in the plate, and would fain make an 

 attack upon it did not fear and weakness prevent. Behind is a sort of French poodle ; 

 he does not seem to be an object of commiseration, and yet his appeal is an argumentum 

 ad misericordiam ; as if any argument short of brute force could move to pity any 

 " Jack in Office," much less such a specimen as that enthroned on the barrow. There 

 is, however, a dog at a little distance from the others whose erect head and tail 

 mdicate that he is rather disposed to try conclusions with the latter : he is a perky. 



