There were six puppies, and as the waggons were empty we fixed up a
roomy nest in one of them for Jess and her family. There was no trouble
with Jess; nobody interfered with her, and she interfered with nobody.
The boys kept clear of her; but we used to take a look at her and the
puppies as we walked along with the waggons; so by degrees she got to
know that we would not harm them, and she no longer wanted to eat us
alive if we went near and talked to her.
Five of the puppies were fat strong yellow little chaps with dark
muzzles--just like their father, as Ted said; and their father was an
imported dog, and was always spoken of as the best dog of the breed that
had ever been in the country. I never saw him, so I do not really know
what he was like--perhaps he was not a yellow dog at all; but, whatever
he was, he had at that time a great reputation because he was
`imported,' and there were not half a dozen imported dogs in the whole
of the Transvaal then. Many people used to ask what breed the puppies
were--I suppose it was because poor cross faithful old Jess was not much
to look at, and because no one had a very high opinion of yellow dogs in
general, and nobody seemed to remember any famous yellow bull-terriers.
They used to smile in a queer way when they asked the question, as if
they were going to get off a joke; but when we answered "Just like their
father--Buchanan's _imported_ dog," the smile disappeared, and they
would give a whistle of surprise and say "By Jove!" and immediately
begin to examine the five yellow puppies, remark upon their ears and
noses and legs, and praise them up until we were all as proud as if they
had belonged to us.
Jess looked after her puppies and knew nothing about the remarks that
were made, so they did not worry her, but I often looked at the faithful
old thing with her dark brindled face, cross-looking eyes and
always-moving ears, and thought it jolly hard lines that nobody had a
good word for her; it seemed rough on her that every one should be glad
there was only one puppy at all like the mother--the sixth one, a poor
miserable little rat of a thing about half the size of the others. He
was not yellow like them, nor dark brindled like Jess, but a sort of
dirty pale half-and-half colour with some dark faint wavy lines all over
him, as if he had tried to be brindled and failed; and he had a dark
sharp wizened little muzzle that looked shrivelled up with age.
Most of the fellows said it would be a good thing to drown the odd one
because he spoilt the litter and made them look as though they were not
really thoroughbred, and because he was such a miserable little rat that
he was not worth saving anyhow; but in the end he was allowed to live.
I believe no one fancied the job of taking one of Jess's puppies away
from her; moreover, as any dog was better than none, I had offered to
take him rather than let him be drowned. Ted had old friends to whom he
had already promised the pick of the puppies, so when I came along it
was too late, and all he could promise me was that if there should be
one over I might have it.
As they grew older and were able to crawl about they were taken off the
waggons when we outspanned and put on the ground. Jess got to
understand this at once, and she used to watch us quite quietly as we
took them in our hands to put them down or lift them back again. When
they were two or three weeks old a man came to the waggons who talked a
great deal about dogs, and appeared to know what had to be done. He
said that the puppies' tails ought to be docked, and that a bull-terrier
would be no class at all with a long tail, but you should on no account
clip his ears. I thought he was speaking of fox-terriers, and that with
bull-terriers the position was the other way round, at that time; but as
he said it was `the thing' in England, and nobody contradicted him, I
shut up. We found out afterwards that he had made a mistake; but it was
too late then, and Jess's puppies started life as bull-terriers up to
date, with long ears and short tails.
I felt sure from the beginning that all the yellow puppies would be
claimed and that I should have to take the odd one, or none at all; so I
began to look upon him as mine already, and to take an interest in him
and look after him. A long time ago somebody wrote that "the sense of
possession turns sand into gold," and it is one of the truest things
ever said. Until it seemed that this queer-looking odd puppy was going
to be mine I used to think and say very much what the others did--but
with this difference, that I always felt sorry for him, and sorry for
Jess too, because he was like her and not like the father. I used to
think that perhaps if he were given a chance he might grow up like poor
old Jess herself, ugly, cross and unpopular, but brave and faithful. I
felt sorry for him, too, because he was small and weak, and the other
five big puppies used to push him away from his food and trample on him;
and when they were old enough to play they used to pull him about by his
ears and pack on to him--three or four to one--and bully him horribly.
Many a time I rescued him, and many a time gave him a little preserved
milk and water with bread soaked in it when the others had shouldered
him out and eaten everything.
After a little while, when my chance of getting one of the good puppies
seemed hopeless and I got used to the idea that I would have to take the
odd one, I began to notice little things about him that no one else
noticed, and got to be quite fond of the little beggar--in a kind of
way. Perhaps I was turning my sand into gold, and my geese into swans;
perhaps I grew fond of him simply because, finding him lonely and with
no one else to depend on, I befriended him; and perhaps it was because
he was always cheerful and plucky and it seemed as if there might be
some good stuff in him after all. Those were the things I used to think
of sometimes when feeding the little outcast. The other puppies would
tumble him over and take his food from him; they would bump into him
when he was stooping over the dish of milk and porridge, and his head
was so big and his legs so weak that he would tip up and go heels over
head into the dish. We were always picking him out of the food and
scraping it off him: half the time he was wet and sticky, and the other
half covered with porridge and sand baked hard by the sun.
One day just after the waggons had started, as I took a final look round
the outspan place to see if anything had been forgotten, I found the
little chap--who was only about four inches high--struggling to walk
through the long grass. He was not big enough or strong enough to push
his way--even the stems of the down-trodden grass tripped him--and he
stumbled and floundered at every step, but he got up again each time
with his little tail standing straight up, his head erect, and his ears
cocked. He looked such a ridiculous sight that his little tragedy of
"lost in the veld" was forgotten--one could only laugh.
What he thought he was doing, goodness only knows; he looked as proud
and important as if he owned the whole world and knew that every one in
it was watching him. The poor little chap could not see a yard in that
grass; and in any case he was not old enough to see much, or understand
anything, for his eyes still had that bluish blind look that all very
young puppies have, but he was marching along as full of confidence as a
general at the head of his army. How he fell out of the waggon no one
knew; perhaps the big puppies tumbled him out, or he may have tried to
follow Jess, or have climbed over the tail-board to see what was the
other side, for he was always going off exploring by himself. His
little world was small, it may be--only the bed-plank of the waggon and
the few square yards of the ground on which they were dumped at the
outspans--but he took it as seriously as any explorer who ever tackled a
continent.
The others were a bit more softened towards the odd puppy when I caught
up to the waggons and told them of his valiant struggle to follow; and
the man who had docked the puppies' tails allowed, "I believe the rat's
got pluck, whatever else is the matter with him, for he was the only one
that didn't howl when I snipped them. The little cuss just gave a grunt
and turned round as if he wanted to eat me. I think he'd 'a' been
terrible angry if he hadn't been so s'prised. Pity he's such an
awful-looking mongrel."
But no one else said a good word for him: he was really beneath notice,
and if ever they had to speak about him they called him "The Rat."
There is no doubt about it he was extremely ugly, and instead of
improving as he grew older, he became worse; yet, I could not help
liking him and looking after him, sometimes feeling sorry for him,
sometimes being tremendously amused, and sometimes--wonderful to
relate--really admiring him. He was extraordinarily silent; while the
others barked at nothing, howled when lonely, and yelled when frightened
or hurt, the odd puppy did none of these things; in fact, he began to
show many of Jess's peculiarities; he hardly ever barked, and when he
did it was not a wild excited string of barks but little suppressed
muffled noises, half bark and half growl, and just one or two at a time;
and he did not appear to be afraid of anything, so one could not tell
what he would do if he was.
One day we had an amusing instance of his nerve: one of the oxen,
sniffing about the outspan, caught sight of him all alone, and filled
with curiosity came up to examine him, as a hulking silly old tame ox
will do. It moved towards him slowly and heavily with its ears spread
wide and its head down, giving great big sniffs at this new object,
trying to make out what it was. "The Rat" stood quite still with his
stumpy tail cocked up and his head a little on one side, and when the
huge ox's nose was about a foot from him he gave one of those funny
abrupt little barks. It was as if the object had suddenly `gone off'
like a cracker, and the ox nearly tumbled over with fright; but even
when the great mountain of a thing gave a clumsy plunge round and
trotted off, "The Rat" was not the least frightened; he was startled,
and his tail and ears flickered for a second, but stiffened up again
instantly, and with another of those little barks he took a couple of
steps forward and cocked his head on the other side. That was his way.
He was not a bit like the other puppies; if any one fired off a gun or
cracked one of the big whips the whole five would yell at the top of
their voices and, wherever they were, would start running, scrambling
and floundering as fast as they could towards the waggon without once
looking back to see what they were running away from. The odd puppy
would drop his bone with a start or would jump round; his ears and tail
would flicker up and down for a second; then he would slowly bristle up
all over, and with his head cocked first on one side and then on the
other, stare hard with his half-blind bluish puppy eyes in the direction
of the noise; but he never ran away.
And so, little by little, I got to like him in spite of his awful
ugliness. And it really was awful! The other puppies grew big all
over, but the odd one at that time seemed to grow only in one part--his
tummy! The poor little chap was born small and weak; he had always been
bullied and crowded out by the others, and the truth is he was half
starved. The natural consequence of this was that as soon as he could
walk about and pick up things for himself he made up for lost time, and
filled up his middle piece to an alarming size before the other parts of
his body had time to grow; at that time he looked more like a big
tock-tockie beetle than a dog.
Besides the balloon-like tummy he had stick-out bandy-legs, very like a
beetle's too, and a neck so thin that it made the head look enormous,
and you wondered how the neck ever held it up. But what made him so
supremely ridiculous was that he evidently did not know he was ugly; he
walked about as if he was always thinking of his dignity, and he had
that puffed-out and stuck-up air of importance that you only see in
small people and bantam cocks who are always trying to appear an inch
taller than they really are.
When the puppies were about a month old, and could feed on porridge or
bread soaked in soup or gravy, they got to be too much for Jess, and she
used to leave them for hours at a time and hide in the grass so as to
have a little peace and sleep. Puppies are always hungry, so they soon
began to hunt about for themselves, and would find scraps of meat and
porridge or old bones; and if they could not get anything else, would
try to eat the raw-hide nekstrops and reims. Then the fights began. As
soon as one puppy saw another busy on anything, he would walk over
towards him and, if strong enough, fight him for it. All day long it
was nothing but wrangle, snarl, bark and yelp. Sometimes four or five
would be at it in one scrum; because as soon as one heard a row going on
he would trot up hoping to steal the bone while the others were busy
fighting.
It was then that I noticed other things about the odd puppy: no matter
how many packed on to him, or how they bit or pulled him, he never once
let out a yelp; with four or five on top of him you would see him on his
back, snapping right and left with bare white teeth, gripping and
worrying them when he got a good hold of anything, and all the time
growling and snarling with a fierceness that was really comical. It
sounded as a lion fight might sound in a toy phonograph.
Before many days passed, it was clear that some of the other puppies
were inclined to leave "The Rat" alone, and that only two of them--the
two biggest--seemed anxious to fight him and could take his bones away.
The reason soon became apparent: instead of wasting his breath in making
a noise, or wasting strength in trying to tumble the others over, "The
Rat" simply bit hard and hung on; noses, ears, lips, cheeks, feet and
even tails--all came handy to him; anything he could get hold of and
hang on to was good enough, and the result generally was that in about
half a minute the other puppy would leave everything and clear off
yelling, and probably holding up one paw or hanging its head on one side
to ease a chewed ear.
When either of the big puppies tackled the little fellow the fight
lasted much longer. Even if he were tumbled over at once--as generally
happened--and the other one stood over him barking and growling, that
did not end the fight: as soon as the other chap got off him he would
struggle up and begin again; he would not give in. The other puppies
seemed to think there was some sort of rule like the `count out' in
boxing, or that once you were tumbled over you ought to give up the
bone; but the odd puppy apparently did not care about rules; as far as I
could see, he had just one rule: "Stick to it," so it was not very long
before even the two big fellows gave up interfering with him. The bites
from his little white teeth--sharp as needles--which punctured noses and
feet and tore ears, were most unpleasant. But apart from that, they
found there was nothing to be gained by fighting him: they might roll
him over time after time, but he came back again and worried them so
persistently that it was quite impossible to enjoy the bone--they had to
keep on fighting for it.
At first I drew attention to these things, but there was no
encouragement from the others; they merely laughed at the attempt to
make the best of a bad job. Sometimes owners of other puppies were
nettled by having their beauties compared with "The Rat," or were
annoyed because he had the cheek to fight for his own and beat them.
Once, when I had described how well he had stood up to Billy's pup,
Robbie caught up "The Rat," and placing him on the table, said: "Hats
off to the Duke of Wellington on the field of Waterloo." That seemed to
me the poorest sort of joke to send five grown men into fits of
laughter. He stood there on the table with his head on one side, one
ear standing up, and his stumpy tail twiggling--an absurd picture of
friendliness, pride and confidence; yet he was so ugly and ridiculous
that my heart sank, and I whisked him away. They made fun of him, and
he did not mind; but it was making fun of me too, and I could not help
knowing why; it was only necessary to put the puppies together to see
the reason.
After that I stopped talking about him, and made the most of the good
points he showed, and tried to discover more. It was the only
consolation for having to take the leavings of the litter.
Then there came a day when something happened which might easily have
turned out very differently, and there would have been no stories and no
Jock to tell about; and the best dog in the world would never have been
my friend and companion. The puppies had been behaving very badly, and
had stolen several nekstrops and chewed up parts of one or two big
whips; the drivers were grumbling about all the damage done and the
extra work it gave them; and Ted, exasperated by the worry of it all,
announced that the puppies were quite old enough to be taken away, and
that those who had picked puppies must take them at once and look after
them, or let some one else have them. When I heard him say that my
heart gave a little thump from excitement, for I knew the day had come
when the great question would be settled once and for all. Here was a
glorious and unexpected chance; perhaps one of the others would not or
could not take his, and I might get one of the good ones... Of course
the two big ones would be snapped up: that was certain; for, even if the
men who had picked them could not take them, others; who had been
promised puppies before me would exchange those they had already chosen
for the better ones. Still, there were other chances; and I thought of
very little else all day long, wondering if any of the good ones would
be left; and if so, which?
In the afternoon Ted came up to where we were all lying in the shade and
startled us with the momentous announcement:
"Billy Griffiths can't take his pup!"
Every man of us sat up. Billy's pup was the first pick, the champion of
the litter, the biggest and strongest of the lot. Several of the others
said at once that they would exchange theirs for this one; but Ted
smiled and shook his head.
"No," he said, "you had a good pick in the beginning." Then he turned
to me, and added: "You've only had leavings." Some one said "The Rat,"
and there was a shout of laughter, but Ted went on; "You can have
Billy's pup."
It seemed too good to be true; not even in my wildest imaginings had I
fancied myself getting the pick of the lot. I hardly waited to thank
Ted before going off to look at my champion. I had seen and admired him
times out of number, but it seemed as if he must look different now that
he belonged to me. He was a fine big fellow, well built and strong, and
looked as if he could beat all the rest put together. His legs were
straight; his neck sturdy; his muzzle dark and shapely; his ears equal
and well carried; and in the sunlight his yellow coat looked quite
bright, with occasional glints of gold in it. He was indeed a handsome
fellow.
As I put him back again with the others the odd puppy, who had stood up
and sniffed at me when I came, licked my hand and twiddled his tail with
the friendliest and most independent air, as if he knew me quite well
and was glad to see me, and I patted the poor little chap as he waddled
up. I had forgotten him in the excitement of getting Billy's pup; but
the sight of him made me think of his funny ways, his pluck and
independence, and of how he had not a friend in the world except Jess
and me; and I felt downright sorry for him. I picked him up and talked
to him; and when his wizened little face was close to mine, he opened
his mouth as if laughing, and shooting out his red tongue dabbed me
right on the tip of my nose in pure friendliness. The poor little
fellow looked more ludicrous than ever: he had been feeding again and
was as tight as a drum; his skin was so tight one could not help
thinking that if he walked over a mimosa thorn and got a scratch on the
tummy he would burst like a toy balloon.
I put him back with the other puppies and returned to the tree where Ted
and the rest were sitting. As I came up there was a shout of laughter,
and--turning round to see what had provoked it--I found "The Rat" at my
heels. He had followed me and was trotting and stumbling along,
tripping every yard or so, but getting up again with head erect, ears
cocked and his stumpy tail twiddling away just as pleased and proud as
if he thought he had really started in life and was doing what only a
`really and truly' grown-up dog is supposed to do--that is, follow his
master wherever he goes.
All the old chaff and jokes were fired off at me again, and I had no
peace for quite a time. They all had something to say: "He won't swap
you off!"
"I'll back `The Rat'!" "He is going to take care of you!"
"He is afraid you'll get lost!" and so on; and they were still chaffing
about it when I grabbed "The Rat" and took him back again.
Billy's failure to take his puppy was so entirely unexpected and so
important that the subject kept cropping up all the evening. It was
very amusing then to see how each of those who had wanted to get him
succeeded in finding good reasons for thinking that his own puppy was
really better than Billy's. However they differed in their estimates of
each other's dogs, they all agreed that the best judge in the world
could not be certain of picking out the best dog in a good litter until
the puppies were several months old; and they all gave instances in
which the best looking puppy had turned out the worst dog, and others in
which the one that no one would look at had grown up to be the champion.
Goodness knows how long this would have gone on if Robbie had not
mischievously suggested that "perhaps `The Rat' was going to beat the
whole lot." There was such a chorus of guffaws at this that no one told
any more stories.
The poor little friendless Rat! It was unfortunate, but the truth is
that he was uglier than before; and yet I could not help liking him. I
fell asleep that night thinking of the two puppies--the best and the
worst in the litter. No sooner had I gone over all the splendid points
in Billy's pup and made up my mind that he was certainly the finest I
had ever seen, than the friendly wizened little face, the half-cocked
ears and head on one side, the cocky little stump of a tail, and the
comical dignified plucky look of the odd puppy would all come back to
me. The thought of how he had licked my hand and twiddled his tail at
me, and how he dabbed me on the nose, and then the manful way in which
he had struggled after me through the grass, all made my heart go soft
towards him, and I fell asleep not knowing what to do.
When I woke up in the morning, my first thought was of the odd puppy--
how he looked to me as his only friend, and what he would feel like if,
after looking on me as really belonging to him and as the one person
that he was going to take care of all his life, he knew he was to be
left behind or given away to any one who would take him. It would never
have entered his head that he required some one to look after him; from
the way he had followed me the night before it was clear he was looking
after me; and the other fellows thought the same thing. His whole
manner had plainly said: "Never mind old man! Don't you worry: I am
here."
We used to make our first trek at about three o'clock in the morning, so
as to be outspanned by sunrise; and walking along during that morning
trek I recalled all the stories that the others had told of miserable
puppies having grown into wonderful dogs, and of great men who had been
very ordinary children; and at breakfast I took the plunge.
"Ted," I said, bracing myself for the laughter, "if you don't mind, I'll
stick to `The Rat.'"
If I had fired off a gun under their noses they would have been much
less startled. Robbie made a grab for his plate as it slipped from his
knees.
"_Don't_ do that sort of thing!" he protested indignantly. "My nerves
won't stand it!"
The others stopped eating and drinking, held their beakers of steaming
coffee well out of the way to get a better look at me, and when they saw
it was seriously meant there was a chorus of: "Well, I'm hanged."
I took him in hand at once--for now he was really mine--and brought him
over for his saucer of soaked bread and milk to where we sat at
breakfast. Beside me there was a rough camp table--a luxury sometimes
indulged in while camping or trekking with empty waggons--on which we
put our tinned-milk, treacle and such things to keep them out of reach
of the ants, grasshoppers, Hottentot-gods, beetles and dust. I put the
puppy and his saucer in a safe place under the table out of the way of
stray feet, and sank the saucer into the sand so that when he trod in it
he would not spill the food; for puppies are quite stupid as they are
greedy, and seem to think that they can eat faster by getting further
into the dish. He appeared to be more ravenous than usual, and we were
all amused by the way the little fellow craned his thin neck out further
and further until he tipped up behind and his nose bumping into the
saucer see-sawed him back again. He finished it all and looked round
briskly at me, licking his lips and twiddling his stumpy tail.
Well, I meant to make a dog of him, so I gave him another lot. He was
just like a little child--he thought he was very hungry still and could
eat any amount more; but it was not possible. The lapping became slower
and more laboured, with pauses every now and then to get breath or lick
his lips and look about him, until at last he was fairly beaten: he
could only look at it, blink and lick his chops; and, knowing that he
would keep on trying, I took the saucer away. He was too full to object
or to run after it; he was too full to move. He stood where he was,
with his legs well spread and his little body blown out like a balloon,
and finished licking the drops and crumbs off his face without moving a
foot.
There was something so extraordinarily funny in the appearance and
attitude of the puppy that we watched to see what he would do next. He
had been standing very close to the leg of the table, but not quite
touching it, when he finished feeding; and even after he had done
washing his face and cleaning up generally, he stood there stock-still
for several minutes, as though it was altogether too much trouble to
move. One little bandy hind leg stuck out behind the table-leg, and the
bulge of his little tummy stuck out in front of it; so that when at last
he decided to make a move the very first little lurch brought his hip up
against the table-leg. In an instant the puppy's appearance changed
completely: the hair on his back and shoulders bristled; his head went
up erect; one ear stood up straight and the other at half cock; and his
stumpy tail quivered with rage. He evidently thought that one of the
other puppies had come up behind to interfere with him. He was too
proud to turn round and appear to be nervous: with head erect he glared
hard straight in front of him, and, with all the little breath that he
had left after his big feed, he growled ferociously in comical little
gasps. He stood like that, not moving an inch, with the front foot
still ready to take that step forward; and then, as nothing more
happened, the hair on his back gradually went flat again; the fierceness
died out of his face; and the growling stopped.
After a minute's pause, he again very slowly and carefully began to step
forward; of course exactly the same thing happened again, except that
this time he shook all over with rage, and the growling was fiercer and
more choky. One could not imagine anything so small being in so great a
rage. He took longer to cool down, too, and much longer before he made
the third attempt to start. But the third time it was all over in a
second. He seemed to think that this was more than any dog could stand,
and that he must put a stop to it. The instant his hip touched the leg,
he whipped round with a ferocious snarl--his little white teeth bared
and gleaming--and bumped his nose against the table-leg.
I cannot say whether it was because of the shout of laughter from us, or
because he really understood what had happened, that he looked so
foolish, but he just gave one crestfallen look at me and with a feeble
wag of his tail waddled off as fast as he could.
Then Ted nodded over at me, and said: "I believe you have got the
champion after all!" And I was too proud to speak.