The Rhode Island Republican

THE IDLENESS OF DOGS.
BY THEODORE S. FAY.

I have been occasionally struck with a "compunctious visiting of nature," (not that I am canine,) on seeing a great, good-natured dog, panting and toiling before a Lilliputian wagon, containing a fellow dragged round the town, by this faithful lover and ally of our race. We are apt to condemn the most just measures, when they shock our habits of thinking. A horse toils away a life in harness without sympathy, but an industrious dog is immediately a matter of commiseration.

Since this is the age of utilitarianism, I rather approve of making every body earn their own subsistence. I work! No one pities me. And no one experienced in editorial affairs will pretend to compare their multifarious labors and perplexities with mere straight forward pulling. The dog has decidedly the best of it, and I shall not countenance him or his advocates in aristocratic and luxurious idleness. I want none of your primogeniture! We want useful citizens, dogs and men. So long as these animals are subject to no abuse, so long as they are well fed, (they have the advantage of us, poor nude bipeds, in clothing !) a little exercise will do them no harm. Were every member of society, without reference to the number of his legs, subject to the same wholesome necessity, the sum of earthly happiness (now not over large) would be materially increased. There has been somewhat too much of this elegant indolence in the world. The gentlemanlike leisure and independence of your dog, has struck me more than once with the full emphasis of a contrast. There is not one among the tenants of the ark, who, under a frank and honest seeming, has managed to cheat the sympathies of man more than this same dog. He is the slyest of quadrupeds. Talk of a fox ! It is nothing. He has cunning for every thing but to conceal his cunning, and, after all, what has it brought him to ? Like his prototypes among the bipeds, he loses more than he gains, (your cunning people are always marked and despised !) He suffers the odium, not only of all the crimes he commits, but of all that are committed, whether he have been accessary or not. The dog has feasted on many a sheep, and gone off to a quiet nap in the sunshine, leaving the fox to bear the blame. Every one is on the watch for him. Every one distrusts, understands and hates him. He is a poor, outlawed, hunted wretch, and, with all his cunning, nearly starved. But look at Master Tray. Look not only at his demeanor, but at the confidence and privileges which he has slyly usurped. What a sycophant! How he fawns and flatters! You think it is affection. So thinks every monarch of his toad-eater. If you doubt the superior cunning of this fat office-holder, examine into his manner of life. He is the only creature which lives in abundance, enjoys all the results of civilization, and does nothing. He is a perfect monk in exemption from temporal duties. His situation is a sinecure. Other beasts yield their labor or their lives as tributes for protection and support, extended them by the lord of creation. The ox strains beneath the yoke, the horse pants and foams under the whip and the burden. The poultry have a holiday of it, which, like other holidays, is very well while it lasts, but the end is awkward. The decapitated hen liquidates her debt with her life ; and the gallant cock, after his brief but brilliant despotism, snatched, like a Roman emperor, from the throne to the block, dearly pays, by a premature death on the scaffold, for a youth of delightful affluence and dignified leisure. The sturdy and herculean calf too, led, in the perfection of his strength and beauty unsuspectingly, from the meadow to the slaughterhouse--is there no pity, oh ye eater of veal ! for the animal spirits, the bright feeling of life and enjoyment, extinguished in his youthful frame to provide your careless banquet?--And the poor simple sheep, with their innocent and happy lambs, grouped, on a summer morning, upon a velvet field, in the repose and voluptuousness of perfect content! Is it not like a massacre of the innocent, the quenching, in those sinless hearts, of the conscious light of a pleasing existence?

Our friend Tray hath no share in this inexorable balancing of accounts. He toils not. He bleeds not. He does not even pity those which toil and bleed. He stands by laughing at the execution of his old compatriot, the cock, and plays with the gasping head and quivering trunk. He lies unshadowingly down while the murder of the lamb is going on at his side, and makes a meal from him even before he is cooked. Like a well fed abbot, he lives on the fat of the land without earning it. Indeed he wheedles man out of a capital living ; and, like all such favorites, he is insolent in proportion as he is prosperous and idle. Mark the fellow's arrogance over the population of the barnyard! His despotism among the sheep! His persecution of the unhappy pigs! His superciliousness amid the poultry. His impertinence to the cat! He is a thorough bully to every one but his master and his master's friends. Then his presumption!--There is no end to it. He thinks himself lord and dictator of the whole country. He must examine every one who visits the farm, and he has a hearty hatred, too, of your strangers and intruders. He must know who is passing on the road. He has the inquisitorial propensities of a continental custom-house officer. He would stop your carriage if his mouth were strong enough. If he cannot arrest your wheel, he will frighten your horses. Failing in that, he insults you with a bark, and a glance more malicious, because ineffectual. He is a perfect Wolsey in bearing to all but his master. Upon him he depends for this state and authority, and here peeps out the sycophant. Here is obedience, fawning, cringing, toad-eating! How he watches his time to flatter! Set him on another, and he would spring upon the noblest courser in a moment. He would tear an innocent dove without remorse. There is no limit to his ferocity. Yet he has no independence. Kick him, and he yelps and sneaks away. Bully him, he crouches and licks the dust beneath your feet. You cannot irritate and rouse his self-respect. He is the same to you after the most cruel injustice as he was before. Beat him without cause, trample on him, it is all alike. You are his master. He was born to be a favorite and a slave. He is insensible to oppression. He never exhibits the hardy and frank indignation of a cat, against a blow or an insult. He does not show even the firmness of a mule. He is pliant, mean, and cowardly. Men call this fidelity, while the resolution of the ass is obstinacy, and the natural resentment of the cat, ill-temper and treachery. I have nothing to object against making him work like the rest of us mortals. We will have none of his fawning!

There is a saying, " work like a dog!" curious inasmuch as a dog is among the few animals under the power of man which do no work. He pretends to occupy himself. He will sit sentinel, most ostentatiously, by the hour, over an old jacket ; and carry you an umbrella in his mouth, to the admiration of street-passengers. These pretended services are only a show. Harness him! Make the fellow churn! Let his long holiday have an end! Let him come in for a share in the improvements of the age! Let him feel what republicanism is! Let him taste the cup that man has to drain!

Why should I be a slave and a dog go free ?

New York Mirror.