Chapter I: Preface

Matthew Arnold, explaining why those were his most popular poems
which dealt with his canine pets, Geist, Kaiser, and Max, said
that while comparatively few loved poetry, nearly everyone loved
dogs.

The literature of the Anglo-Saxon is rich in tributes to the
dog, as becomes a race which beyond any other has understood and
developed its four-footed companions. Canine heroes whose
intelligence and faithfulness our prose writers have celebrated
start to the memory in scores--Bill Sykes's white shadow, which
refused to be separated from its master even by death; Rab,
savagely devoted; the immortal Bob, "son of battle"--true souls
all, with hardly a villain among them for artistic contrast.
Even Red Wull, the killer, we admire for his courage and lealty.

Within these covers is a selection from a large body of dog
verse. It is a selection made on the principle of human appeal.
Dialect, and the poems of the earlier writers whose diction
strikes oddly on our modern ears, have for the most part been
omitted. The place of such classics as may be missed is filled
by that vagrant verse which is often most truly the flower of
inspiration.

CONTENTS

PART I
PUPPYHOOD

TITLE AUTHOR PAGE

We Meet at Morn _Hardwicke Drummond Rawnsley_ 3

The Lost Puppy _Henry Firth Wood_ 5

A Laugh in Church _Anonymous_ 8

Treasures _Anonymous_ 10

That There Long Dog _Alice Gill Ferguson_ 11

My Friend _Anonymous_ 12

Ted _Maxine Anna Buck_ 14

Little Lost Pup _Anonymous_ 16

My Brindle Bull-Terrier _Coletta Ryan_ 18

Lauth _Robert Burns_ 20

The Drowned Spaniel _Charles Tennyson Turner_ 21