my way to him; but, before
I can cross the road, he is barking half-way down the next street. I am
not so young as I was and I sometimes think he exercises me more than
is good for me. I could see him from where I was standing in the King's
Road. Evidently he was most indignant. I was too far off to distinguish
the barks, but I could guess what he was saying--

"Damn that man, he's off again."

He made inquiries of a passing dog--

"You haven't smelt my man about anywhere, have you?"

(A dog, of course, would never speak of SEEING anybody or anything,
smell being his leading sense. Reaching the top of a hill, he would say
to his companion--"Lovely smell from here, I always think; I could
sit and sniff here all the afternoon." Or, proposing a walk, he would
say--"I like the road by the canal, don't you? There's something
interesting to catch your nose at every turn.")

"No, I haven't smelt any man in particular," answered the other dog.
"What sort of a smelling man is yours?"

"Oh, an egg-and-bacony sort of a man, with a dash of soap about him."

"That's nothing to go by," retorted the other; "most men would answer to
that description, this time of the morning. Where were you when you last
noticed him?"

At this moment he caught sight of me, and came up, pleased to find me,
but vexed with me for having got lost.

"Oh, here you are," he barked; "didn't you see me go round the corner?
Do keep closer. Bothered if half my time isn't taken up, finding you and
losing you again."

The incident appeared to have made him bad-tempered; he was just in
the humour for a row of any sort. At the top of Sloane Street a stout
military-looking gentleman started running after the Chelsea bus. With
a "Hooroo" William Smith was after him. Had the old gentleman taken no
notice, all would have been well. A butcher boy, driving just behind,
would--I could read it in his eye--have caught Smith a flick as he
darted into the road, which would have served him right; the old
gentleman would have captured his bus; and the affair would have been
ended. Unfortunately, he was that type of retired military man all gout
and curry and no sense. He stopped to swear at the dog. That, of course,
was what Smith wanted. It is not often he gets a scrimmage with a
full-grown man. "They're a poor-spirited lot, most of them," he thinks;
"they won't even answer you back. I like a man who shows a bit of
pluck." He was frenzied with delight at his success.