d at the throat of a stag, and Dick had called
out, "Down, Crusoe," he would have sunk to the earth like a stone. No
doubt it took many months of training to bring the dog to this state
of perfection, but Dick accomplished it by patience, perseverance, and
_love_.

Besides all this, Crusoe could speak! He spoke by means of the dog's
dumb alphabet in a way that defies description. He conversed, so to
speak, with his extremities--his head and his tail. But his eyes, his
soft brown eyes, were the chief medium of communication. If ever the
language of the eyes was carried to perfection, it was exhibited in
the person of Crusoe. But, indeed, it would be difficult to say
which part of his expressive face expressed most--the cocked ears of
expectation, the drooped ears of sorrow; the bright, full eye of
joy, the half-closed eye of contentment, and the frowning eye of
indignation accompanied with a slight, a very slight pucker of the
nose and a gleam of dazzling ivory--ha! no enemy ever saw this last
piece of canine language without a full appreciation of what it meant.
Then as to the tail--the modulations of meaning in the varied wag
of that expressive member--oh! it's useless to attempt description.
Mortal man cannot conceive of the delicate shades of sentiment
expressible by a dog's tail, unless he has studied the subject--the
wag, the waggle, the cock, the droop, the slope, the wriggle! Away
with description--it is impotent and valueless here!

As we have said, Crusoe was meek and mild. He had been bitten, on the
sly, by half the ill-natured curs in the settlement, and had only
shown his teeth in return. He had no enmities--though several
enemies--and he had a thousand friends, particularly among the ranks
of the weak and the persecuted, whom he always protected and avenged
when opportunity offered. A single instance of this kind will serve to
show his character.

One day Dick and Crusoe were sitting on a rock beside the lake--the
same identical rock near which, when a pup, the latter had received
his first lesson. They were conversing as usual, for Dick had elicited
such a fund of intelligence from the dog's mind, and had injected such
wealth of wisdom into it, that he felt convinced it understood every
word he said.

"This is capital weather, Crusoe; ain't it, pup?"

Crusoe made a motion with his head which was quite as significant as a
nod.

"Ha! my pup, I wish that you and I might go and have a slap at the
griz