Fido was a Dalmatian--of the race described by some as blotting paper
and by others as plum pudding dogs. Every line of his body had been
formed by hundreds of years of tradition. You can find his ancestors in
tapestries and petit point in Italian primitives and Flemish family
groups, nestling in voluminous satin petticoats, or running at the heels
of skating children--moving in sedate indifference beside the cortège of
a pope, or barking in gay derision at the tidy Dutch snow. Not "a dog"
or "the dog" but "dog" unspecified and absolute. True, till 1700 it was
largely a matter of silhouette, the lissom outline was there, but with a
certain variety of colouring. Then the 18th century stepped in and made
spots de rigueur--Dalmatians invaded new territory. They conquered the
kingdom of china and occupied a commanding position in coaching prints.
An unaccompanied post chaise, deplorable in life, because unknown in
art, and the expression "carriage dog" came into use for the first time.
The 18th and 19th centuries were the golden age of Dalmatian rule, and
when their dynasty was finally overthrown, it was not by a new upstart
race of dogs, but by a new upstart production of that blind and ugly
mother of strong and hideous children--progress. Motors were invented.
If machinery had a conscience, what a procession of ghosts would it not
be haunted by--ghosts of white fingers and humming spinning wheels,
ghosts of parasols--stiff pagodas of taffetas or rippling fountains of
lace--ghosts of victorias and barouches and tandems--ghosts of spotted
streaks of lightning bounding forward with the grace of cats and the
speed of Derby winners, capering with fastidious frivolity between
yellow wheels.
Dalmatians, console yourselves, you are in good company. Beside you
walks the ghost of civilisation herself--surrounded by the phantom forms
of courtesy and leisure and all the lost company of the divine
superfluous.
Cause and effect, demand and supply, where does the vicious circle begin
and end? Certain it is that when motors began to drench the countryside
in dust and suppress reflexion by providing our afterthoughts with
transport, Dalmatians disappeared. Silently, imperceptibly, putting down
their paws with all the old fastidious grace, they crept out of a world
that had betrayed aristocracy. Only Fido remained--to die of a broken
heart.
When I first saw him, he was a puppy--a thin lanky puppy, waiting to be
filled in by life, a mere sketch of the masterpiece he was to become.
Even in those days he had heavy black charmeuse ears, marvellous thick
rich satin they were, and tiny dark rims to his eyes--a setting of
pencilled shadow. How am I to describe his spots? The wonderful
distribution of black and white, the ruffle at the side of his arched
neck made by the meeting of two competitive rhythms of hairs, the
looseness of his skin, his long lithe legs that would tie themselves
into a tangled heap of grace when he lay down.
To see him move was to see motion made concrete--to see him run was to
realise that even Pavlova had never quite overcome the obstacle of being
a human.
At night he seemed phosphorescent, the dark itself was defeated by his
whiteness. His bark was low and deep and resonant--a church bell of a
bark--it reminded [Transcriber's note: original reads 'remainded'] you
less of a 'cello than all 'cellos--except M. Casal's--remind you of a
bark.
He had the divine irrelevant grace of a cat. Always he was showing off,
practising his paws, curling and stretching and pirouetting, letting
himself go like an arrow out of a bow, circling on the lawn like a
swallow above water, giving you daily a thousand illustrations of how
much you would have lost by only having 100 masterpieces in bronze of
him.
Living with Fido was a daily revelation of absolute beauty. He was the
key to the secret of Phidias and Ucello Pascal and Mozart.
But he was alive, warm and gay and moody--joyous and absurd--full of
little confiding gestures--a nose pressed under one's chin, or a paw
laid in alluring appeal on one's hand. Withal he was detached with the
detachment of his separate universe--a divine world of smells and sounds
and ever new adventurous possibilities, unspoilt by memory and
untarnished by experience.
Dogs are the best company in the world--I would watch Fido abandoning
himself to each moment of the day, the victim or the hero of a hundred
impulses, torn by competing smells and sounds as we are torn by
overlapping warring emotions and ambitions.
And then he would lie sprawling in front of the fire with a half open
eye and when you said "Fido" his ears would answer you, taut with
response, while his tail would beat the floor in indolent happiness. Is
there anything in life so infectiously joyous as a wagging tail? Worry,
distress, crossness, all melt at the sight of it--a hypnotic
conductor's, baton beating the rhythm of triumphant joie de vivre.
Fido was a daily, hourly delight.
I would shut my eyes, to be able to open them suddenly and
realise--with fresh acuteness--his infinite variety. There was to me
something poignant about his loveliness like an open rose in whose very
perfection lies the herald of doom. I loved him too much. The cynical
masterpieces of the past looking at his beauty smiled in satisfied
revenge for they knew that he was alive and that life means death. Love
gives mortality to everything.
Fido grew limp and listless. His nose was hot and dry. He no longer
trotted about, he wandered from room to room. His eyes were dull. His
heart bumped about like money in a money-box. With an effort he wagged
his tail to cheer me up. Wearily he would climb into a chair and lie
there indifferent to my trembling caresses.
Fido died.
* * * * *
I gave up looking at dogs, alive or china, embroidered or painted.
Fortunately most of my friends have "pets," griffons that look like
tropical spiders, little shiny naked shivering animals, bloated
prosperous Pekineses, exuding the complacency of their mistresses and
seeming to be rather the last word of a dressmaker, or a furrier, than a
creation of the Gods.
If I saw a sheepdog, or a greyhound, a spaniel or a retriever, I would
avert my eyes, shivering a little as when the hitherto harmless buzzing
machine reaches the hidden nerve.
"Don't you like dogs?" people would say.