B I Z Z AND HER FOES. 
By Mbs. S. C. Hall. 
IN THREE CHAPTERS. CHAPTER II. 
LET my coal-shed to a very 
plausible, good-for-nothing 
fellow,” said Mr. Hatch- 
ment, “ who promised 
everything, and never 
kept his word ; he was 
an Irishman, but I do not 
desire to reflect on the 
country — some of my best 
customers are Irish, and I 
only wish I had double the number. He brought 
Bizz with him ; she was a slight young thing then, 
a pretty, shiny, active dog, and in time had her 
second litter of pups ; he never paid his rent — I 
offered to forgive it to him ; he would not resign 
possession, but kept the key, though there was 
nothing in the shed but a few sticks. 
“ I ought to have told you, ma’am, that when 
first he came to the place I gave him five shillings 
for the dog, but when she had pups, Mrs. H. found 
her inconvenient, and so the fellow said he’d take 
care of her for me in the shed. When things went 
bad with him, — and I heard since that the dog 
never belonged to him nohow, as the lawful owner 
left her in his care, and paid a shilling a week, or 
something more, for her board and lodging, — he 
would go away and leave her there without food 
or water. I used to thrust her in some through a 
hole, but I dare not go near the door, which she 
understood she was to guard ! The fellow had put 
her up to all sorts of tricks. 
“ One evening, a pair of policemen came with a 
search-warrant ; they had information that some 
stolen goods were in the shed, and they set about 
breaking open the door, but the poor faithful 
animal, who was reduced to a skeleton, had de- 
termined to withstand them to the last. One of the 
men wanted to shoot her, for she looked all teeth 
and fire, but I would not consent, and it was a 
sight how those two great men were kept at bay 
by that small dog, until one of them bethought him 
of a stratagem ; the hole through which I used to 
push her food was close to the straw where her 
pups lay, so he proposed that his companion should 
withdraw a pup, and pinch it to make it cry, while 
VOL. II. IX. 
the other effected the entrance, for well he knew 
that the poor mother would go to her pups. He 
calculated,” added Hatchment, “ on the strength of 
her maternal feelings. 
“ "When he got the little beast outside, he pinched 
and ran with it to my house, and Bizz in full chase. 
Of course the policeman turned out the other pups, 
entered, ami locked the door. As there were four 
pups, poor TBizz had enough to do to carry them to 
shelter, for two had crawled into a pool of water. 
“ The men did not find the goods they expected, 
but I regained possession of my shed. I never saw 
or heard of her master since, and the poor thing 
attached herself to me, chiefly because I saved the 
last of the pups from drowning. She is a wonder- 
ful watch, and if Mrs. H. or I left her in charge of 
our dinners, she’d die dead of starvation before she 
set a tooth in anything, even sheep’s heads, which 
are her favourites ; but once out of the house, she 
knows no law, only to take and keep what she 
fancies. 
“You know the best and the worse of poor Bizz 
now, ma’am ; there she is, an ugly customer, but 
as good a watch as ever winked at a thief. She 
likes to have a yard of her own, and it’s all the 
better if she can’t get out of it. 
“ G-o to the lady, Bizz, and be as faithful to her 
as you’ve been to me ! Mrs. H. will see the loss 
before the month’s out in apples and oranges, and 
want a dog in that time as badly as now she wants 
to get rid of one ; but,” he added, forgetting his 
usual politeness, “ that’s the way with the women, 
— leastways in greengrocery. She’s turned as hard 
against the dog as a frozen turnip ; she’s shut, her 
'eyes against the good, and opened them on the bad 
wider, and forgetting past services, is the worst foe 
the beast has, — worse than cats or boys. But don’t 
mind it, Bizz, if the lady won’t have you, I’ll give 
you as easy a death as if you’d been a lady’s lap- 
dog all the days of your life.” * 
Bizz looked up a.t her master’s round, rubicund 
face, into which he was endeavouring to impart an 
expression of sentiment, as if she said in her hard, 
dry way — “ Don’t be a fool, Hatchment,” and 
with another wink at me, she curled herself round 
D 
