Jgiaka Alo 
BY 
Suffold calls me a wolf-hound, but my 
Grandma Fan tells me I am a Sefton 
Pointer of the bluest of blue blood and 
that we can trace our descent back to 28 
registered grandmothers. We have 
“queens,” “dukes” and “counts” galore 
in our family and that shows we are of the 
finest. Grandma holds her head high and 
says there is no better family than ours 
in the world. Berkshire has a big silver 
cup she won at a bench show, whatever 
that is. He is awfully proud of it and 
my brothers, cousins and sisters all have 
blue ribbons that they got at the same 
place. Anyway, who ever heard of a 
wolf-hound having anything better in his 
iamily than an old Spanish Don? I’m 
not a hound and I don’t see why Suffolk 
is always calling me one. Poland says I 
am the result of depraved precept, and I 
don’t know whether to be proud of him as 
an ancestor or not. Mike says depraved 
precept isn’t in our family at all, but Po- 
land China is always right and I guess 
Mike doesn’t know what he is talking 
about. 
We live here in South Dakota, in a 
great big house of our own, with a high 
fence around it, to keep stray dogs out, 
and we are very comfortable. We are 
all pointers with the exception of Ben and 
Nora. They are Irish; the worst kind 
of shanty Irish water dogs, touchy and 
high headed. When Nora begins to tell 
of the Pats, Barneys and Goureys that are 
in her family and that she knew in Ire- 
land, it makes the Princes and Queens of 
our family seem like plebians. Berk- 
shire has Jack, a fox terrier, but he stays 
outside of the fence to chase cats and 
watch tramps and the clothes on the back 
yard line. Mrs. Berkshire has a dirty, 
little. frowsy-headed thing she calls Hob- 
son, that stays in the house and eats cake, 
and runs out and yelps at everything that 
comes around the place. I never saw such 
a dog. When he is standing still I can’t 
tell which is his head and which is his 
tail. And then his tongue! You never 
saw anything like it. It is about a foot 
long; one of those wet, slobbering ton- 
gues. He always has it out and kisses 
every dirty dog or man that comes along. 
We don’t like him at all. I think Berk- 
shire ought to put a spiked collar on that 
tongue and tie it up. Hobson comes 
around to the fence nearly every day but 
we won't notice him. My sister, Bess, 
Says he has fleas and Nora says he should 
be sent to my cousin George. I don't 
know where that place is and I don’t 
AND SOME 
PE 
83 

OTHER DOGS. 
DE. 
know as it is proper to speak of it, but 
I don’t mean anything wrong. 
I was born in the barn, in a great, warm 
box-stall, and lived there with my mother 
until I was large enough to run around 
myself. When I was old enough to go out 
doors I learned to play by myself on the 
lawn, and to point grasshoppers and blue 
bottle flies. Jack used to come around and 
tell me all about the cats he knew. I used 
to help him run them down and corner 
them, One day I caught a big one, and 
ier atl GiGmmlOtmsece aily, | ttn eit) ete. 
Hobson used to come around, too, at 
first, with all of his tongue, but I bit a big 
hole in his ear one day for kissing me 
and then he didn’t come out any more. 
One day I was playing on the grass 
alone when over the fence came a great, 
big, long-legged dog that nearly scared 
me to death. She was a horrible looking 
creature with her big mouth full of sharp 
teeth and her long legs and tail. I never 
saw anything quite so thin as she was. 
I think she must have had consumption. 
However, she wasn’t nearly so bad as 
she looked. In fact, she was extremely 
ladylike. She told me all about herself 
and her friends. Her name was Lufra 
and she said she hunted jack rabbits with 
her friends. She lived only a block away 
and used to come over very often to call 
On IMmewerole: = saidethat.. some) day she 
would take me out into the country and 
show me what fun it was to chase rabbits. 
One day the wind was blowing hard 
and I got to playing with the clothes on 
the line in the back yard. 
That evening 




I GOT TO PLAYING WITH THE CLOTHES. 

