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Show ABOITiS WATCH DOGS. What" Dealer In Opines Knows from Long Experlenoa. onM Docs Bark la BaamtM, Sam Out of itlOB. and Soma Don't Bark at All Good Polnu of tha Bull Tarrlar ad tha Sky Terrier. "But I am Hot lookioj for eur,'' snapped the lady. "If I waa I should not come to you. I could net all I wanted for nothing." "You can hare this one for nothing-, : ma'am," said tha liberal dealer. "And if he does not suit you I shall not ask you to I bring him back. Just leave the basement door open and set the house cat at him. I'll warrant you'll see him no snore," The lady, says a New York Sun reporter, wa offended. She picked up ber reticule, which she had deposited on a chair, and haughtily swept out of.the store. The dealer politely ;held tbe door open and allowed a vagrant yellow and white cur tofollow her. He watched them until they disappeared in the crowd. oThen he turned to the reporter, who had silently witnessed tbe interview. "She would have given me live dollars for that dog," he said, "If I bad told her he was well bred. Boa Is one of the many people who fancy that the watch dog Is of a peculiar species. Of course, anybody who has the slightest practical knowledge of dogs is aware that they are all watchers. They are the lightest of all sleepers, and are very vigilant and quick to detect a strauge footstep in or near the house. The only difference in their mode of watching lies in their action after they are aroused. The common cur, auch as the one who has 1 just gone out with tbe lady, is by far tbe ' most watchful, but he will bark furiously at 1 any thing; and it is not the pleasantest ' thing imaginable to have tbe house disturbed dis-turbed every time a belated man passes it in the night. But tbe barking dog is the'i one that most women want. They ' have a horror of an animal that bites, and I only aesire to be notified when a robber is about to enter or has already entered the bouse. Then they can put their beads under , the bedclothes and pray that the burglar may be satisfied with stealing every thing he can find outside of their door, and go I away without entering their apartment. ' Of course, this end might be achieved with 1 much greater personal comfort in the absence ab-sence of the dog, when they could sleep I through the danger, instead of lying par- : alysed with terror; but they can't realise that, and always value a dog in proportion to the noise he makes. "The bull terrier is a capital watoh dog. Be never barks, because he feels that he can deal unaided with any burglar; and In nine eases out of ten he is right It is all tooth with him, and a robber rarely knows that he is present until he feels him. But in this line of business he is not a favorite with refined people. You see, there are no bounds to the ferocity of a bull terrier when he Is once aroused, and the lifeless body of robber la an unpleasant thing for tbe servants to find on a kitchen floor when they Rt up tn the morning. I onoe sold a good bull tarrim- to-tbe widow of clergy, man. She lived in a lonely bouse in West-cheater West-cheater County, and before aha had owned the dog a week a burglar climbed through the basement window. He saw the terrier in the dining room, and managed to clamber up on the high mantelpiece. It was a bitterly bit-terly cold night in mid-winter, and he clung there, shivering for several hours, while the dog hungrily licked his jaws underneath. The lady kept no servant, and when she entered the room in the morning she was at first terribly frightened; but the fellow told her such a pitiful story of bis sufferings that she was moved to compassion. She gave him two dollars and a good breakfast, and allowed him to go sway. Then she sent the dog back to me, advising me to shoot him, aa such aavage. remnmelnm bruto was clearly unfit to live. Bull terriers ter-riers and the widows of clergymen have no common ground upon which tbeyeaa arnica bly meet. "I doubt, too, whether bull terriers, faithful, faith-ful, brave, strong and watchful as they are, have rery much intelligence. Certainly they nave not as much as the Scotch or the old-fashioned Bkye; I mean the big silky-haired silky-haired Skye, from which the delicate little thing, like a miniature portrait of his ancestors, an-cestors, has been bred for a lady's lap dog. A prominent lawyer of New Baven bought a fine bull terrier from me about a year ago. On the second night after the dog had been in his possession tha gentleman was a guest at a supper party, and did not reach home until the small hours of tbe morning. The terrier met him at the gate of hit orchard, or-chard, and drove him up an apple tree, where he held bim a prisoner until tbe family fam-ily arose at breakfast time. The dog had only seen blm half a doien times, and he did not recognise him. This is a danger with all bull terriers when used as watch dogs. They reason slowly, and when they onoe reach a conclusion, whether it is wrong or right, they cling to it as tenaciously as tnouga It was an opponent's throat or a prowling tramp's leg, and, like a gun with an imperfect breech, they are apt to injure their owners in an excess of seal. Nothing will beguile them to forget their duty while life last, but their sense of smell is very weak, and a bit of poisoned meat thrown over the fence is tolerably sure to clear the course for the burglars when they arrive, ready for business, at night "B far the best dog for keeping watch and ward In a country house is one of the large lightrcolored, rough-coated terriers, with as little of the reduced breeds about him as is possible. Be need not be a pure strain, but there must be no bad blood in him. A cross of Scotch and Irish Is very good, but, I think, the old bkye and large plain Scotch is better. It should produce a dog weighing about twelve pounds. (Such an animal, without either the strength or tbe ferocity of the bull terrier, baa all his courage, tempered with a good deal of discretion. dis-cretion. When he hears a noise near any of the doors or windows he does not at once befjin to bark. He goes cautiously to the place whence tbe sound came, and, of course, generally finds that It was made by the wind, or some harmless passer-by, and the sleepers are not aroused without reason. rea-son. But when ha bark you may feel assured as-sured thai it la time for you to get up, for he never gives a false alarm ; and if there is any fighting to be done he will take bis full share of It. But he It no foot He can nut deal with the burglars alone, and he is not going to try to do so. Bis bark almost invariably frightens them away, but if your house Is isolated and they persist in trying" to enter it, you eah safely count Upon him as a valuable assistant The bull terrier allows them to come In before be begins operations, while the rough-coated dog en deavora Vo keep the door between you and tuem." - |