"May Rab and me bide?" said James.
"_You_ may; and Rab, if he will behave himself."
"I'se warrant he's do that, doctor;" and in slunk the faithful beast.
I wish you could have seen him. There are no such dogs now. He belonged
to a lost tribe. As I have said, he was brindled, and gray like Rubislaw
granite; his hair short, hard, and close, like a lion's; his body
thickset, like a little bull--a sort of compressed Hercules of a dog. He
must have been ninety pounds' weight, at the least; he had a large blunt
head; his muzzle black as night, his mouth blacker than any night, a
tooth or two--being all he had--gleaming out of his jaws of darkness.
His head was scarred with the records of old wounds, a sort of series of
fields of battle all over it; one eye out, one ear cropped as close as
was Archbishop Leighton's father's; the remaining eye had the power of
two; and above it, and in constant communication with it, was a tattered
rag of an ear, which was forever unfurling itself, like an old flag; and
then that bud of a tail, about one inch long, if it could in any sense
be said to be long, being as broad as long--the mobility, the
instantaneousness of that bud were very funny and surprising, and its
expressive twinklings and winkings, the intercommunications between the
eye, the ear, and it, were of the oddest and swiftest.
Rab had the dignity and simplicity of great size; and having fought his
way all along the road to absolute supremacy, he was as mighty in his
own line as Julius Cæsar or the Duke of Wellington, and had the gravity
of all great fighters.
You must have often observed the likeness of certain men to certain
animals, and of certain dogs to men. Now, I never looked at Rab without
thinking of the great Baptist preacher, Andrew Fuller. The same large,
heavy, menacing, combative, sombre, honest countenance, the same deep
inevitable eye, the same look--as of thunder asleep, but ready--neither
a dog nor a man to be trifled with.
Next day, my master, the surgeon, examined Ailie. There was no doubt it
must kill her, and soon. It could be removed--it might never return--it
would give her speedy relief--she should have it done.