it. No doubt, in the majority of
instances, he deserves to be so made bereft. On some, however, such
things come hard.

The room in which Murphy had taken up his abode was part library, part
studio, and part a good many other things. A large picture--the canvas
measured six feet--was being worked upon on this second morning after the
young dog's arrival; and, as was perversely ruled, it was just here that
an accident occurred that might well have been judged impossible. The
easel, in fact, with its huge canvas, was overset, carrying many things
into limbo as they fell; and with the fate that too often pursues the
unfortunate, Murphy therefore found himself suddenly buried beneath a
mixed assortment of articles to which he had hitherto been strange. To
add to the rest, a whole string of cattle and sheep bells, brought from
various parts of the world, were set ringing, and others were dislodged;
and for the moment it appeared that the dog must certainly have been
killed. The only good thing subsequently gathered from the strange
proceedings was that the dog had uttered no whimper. But if he was
frightened before, he was terror-stricken now; and matters had therefore
gone from bad to worse.

There is little need to describe what followed. On the one hand, it was
judged that this was the proverbial last straw; that the dog would
assuredly never recover now; and that therefore the only thing to be done
was to send him back, with an earnest appeal for his life to be spared.
Yet, once again, cooler judgments in the end prevailed. The dog had not
whimpered. There was something in that. Moreover, by what had now
occurred, an injury had been done to his already unhappy spirit, and,
unless all honour had ceased to find a place between man and dog,
reparation was certainly his due. In one quarter a sense of pity had
furthermore been generated--a fact, though unsuspected at the time, that
was to prove the hub round which Murphy's whole future was destined to
revolve. An appeal to the heart, if such once gets home, can never really
fail--unless, as Murphy's countrymen might say, the person appealed to
proves heartless.

Thus it was that a sheet of paper that left the house the same evening
contained words to this effect:

"I ought to have written to you before about Murphy, as also to have sent
you the enclosed cheque. But, to tell you the truth, I have been so much
puzzled by this dog that I have purposely waited a day or two be