"with many a friskWide scampering, snatches up the drifted snowWith ivory teeth, or ploughs it with his snout;Then shakes his powder'd coat, and barks for joy."
"with many a friskWide scampering, snatches up the drifted snowWith ivory teeth, or ploughs it with his snout;Then shakes his powder'd coat, and barks for joy."
"with many a frisk
Wide scampering, snatches up the drifted snow
With ivory teeth, or ploughs it with his snout;
Then shakes his powder'd coat, and barks for joy."
As for dramatics, Sigurd loved to thrust his stick deep into a pile of russet leaves or sparkling snow, and then pretend that he was a sanguinary monster whose prey had escaped him, and dig and nose and scrape and scatter and tear and shuffle with frenzied energy, rumbling all the while growls of awful menace, until he had tossed it up to seize and worry, display to the audience always requisite for these performances, and then bury it again for a repetition of the melodrama.
When the winter storms kept him in, his surging vitality made him as restless as an imprisoned wind. If the Cave of Æolus boasted a housekeeper, she had our sympathy. All day long Sigurd would scoot and spin about the little range of rooms that we liked to have quiet and orderly, a very electric battery of mischief. He would pick quarrels with the rugs, scatter the pile of newspapers and dance a scandalous jig with that elderly, respectable Bostonian,The Transcript. He would bump into a gracefully leaning broom and a meditative mop, knocking their wooden wits together and bringing them to the floor with what he considered a beautiful bang. He would stir up civil war on the hearth till poker and tongs and dust-brush and bellows all set upon one another with hideous clang of combat. At last we would toss over to him, in desperation, an old pair of rubbers, and he would make love to one and try to swallow the other, playing as many parts as Bottom longed for, all the way from Pyramus to Lion.
A new stage was provided for him when the storm was over and we undertook to shovel the drift off the piazza. He would instantly claim the star rôle of rival shovel, pawing the powdery heaps with delirious zest, or he would be the snow itself, ecstatically indignant at being swept down the steps. He played thrilling tragi-comedies with bones, too, especially with one monstrous knuckle that might have belonged to the skeleton of Polyphemus, the prize of one of Sigurd's evening prowls. It was a bitter cold midnight, but our happy rebel, sporting with that giant joint, tossing it about in the snow, losing it on purpose, catching its glimmer by grace of the moon and madly pouncing on it once more, would not obey the bed-time whistle. He stretched himself out, a saffron blotch on the white, and hugged his treasure, crunching away persuasively to convince us that the clock was wrong and it was still only dinner time. Our ignominious resort, in such a case, was to fetch from a certain pantry box, the daily object of Sigurd's supplicating sniffs, a piece of cake, and proceed to eat it, with vulgar smack of ostentatious relish, in the doorway, under the electric light. As ever, this stratagem brought our mutineer to terms. Giving the bone a last affectionate lick, he came bounding into the hall in time for the crumbs. But his high spirits were far from spent. Though he consented to play Yellow Caterpillar, curling up in the blanketed round clothes-basket which, for the winter, displaced his Thunder-and-Lightning rug, he barked so often through the small hours, in his dreams or out, that our slumbers were literally curtailed. Rebuked into silence, he gnawed his leash in two, tipped over his basket and settled himself for a morning snooze on the forbidden lounge.
It is obvious that Sigurd was not a model of virtue. We did not want him so much better than ourselves. "That dog would be improved by a good licking," said Joy-of-Life's visiting elder brother. But with all respect for elder brothers—my own had nearly hanged Sigurd by an ingenious contrivance of ropes and loops designed to enable me to unleash him on a summer morning from my sleeping balcony—we decided that we would rather have our collie with all his frolic imperfections on his head than cowed into slavish obedience. Only once when, hardly out of puppyhood, he dashed from my side, as we were walking decorously on the sidewalk, and danced backward on his hind legs in front of a dodging automobile, out-barking its distracted horn, did I attempt to whip him. He had barely escaped with life and limb and, determined to impress him, for his own safety, with his wrong-doing, I caught him by the collar, doubled the leash which I still carried but had almost ceased to use, and began to beat him with it about the head. Sigurd's astonished yelp was answered in an instant from the side street where dwelt the Sisters and, like a white knight of chivalry, Laddie came charging out, thrusting himself between us, leaping upon me and demanding, with a wrath seldom seen in his gentle eyes, that I stop maltreating his twin.
Of course the brothers took the chance to run away together. It was slushy going and when Sigurd came home at seven o'clock, so tired that he could hardly drag one muddy foot after another, he was in shocking trim, his white hose and shirt-front soaked to a disreputable gray. It was unlucky, for his amateur dramatics were to be crowned that evening by a public part on the college stage. He was to be Faithful Dog, watching beside his master,—a forgotten hero of the Revolution,—as that gallant young lieutenant slept away the hour before daybreak, when he was to be executed as a spy. At a low whistle of the rescuer beneath the window, Faithful Dog was to arouse his master by placing a wary paw upon the sleeper's breast and, when the lieutenant had made good his escape, remain behind to face the angry guard and be shot extremely dead in his master's place. Sigurd had thrown himself into this noble rôle with enthusiasm and rehearsed it several times with distinguished success.
An escort of sophomores had been waiting for him in an agony of impatience and, when he at last arrived, there could be no thought of dinner or a nap. Sigurd was hustled down to the laundry, put through merciless ablutions and rushed off to the college barn, our impromptu theater, in the snug little vehicle that our liveryman called his "coop." Three or four girls were sardined in with him, flourishing towels and doing their best to scrub him dry on the way. But it was a ruffled, soapsudsy and excessively drowsy Faithful Dog that trotted out upon the stage, yawned in the face of the rapturous greeting of his congregated friends, the Barn Swallows, jumped up on the prison cot, never meant for him, and rolled himself into a solid slumber-ball, refusing to wake, not even so much as blink, from first to last of the drama. With natural presence of mind, an essential quality in spies, the hero soliloquized to the audience that his Faithful Dog had been drugged, evoking a round of applause at which Sigurd dreamily flapped his tail.
One rôle that he never could be induced to play was that of Dandy. One Sunday afternoon, when he came limping in with his feet all cut and sore from a morning frisk over rough ice, I dressed them in discarded white kid gloves, tying each firmly round the ankle, and started out with Sigurd for a call on the Dryad. But our sturdy Viking resented such dudish apparel and would flump down, at brief intervals, on the crusted drifts and tug away at that detested frippery with the result that, on his arrival, only the paw he thrust out at his amused hostess was still elegant in a tatter of white kid.
Sigurd believed in elective courses rather than required. There were certain things that, as a matter of principle, he persistently refused to learn. Though by nature a dig, as my sister's flower-beds too often testified, not her most fervent remonstrances could convince him that bulbs and bones should not be planted together. His general attitude toward education was not unique. He had "come to college for the life." From the narrow paths of learning he bounded off in pursuit of a "well-rounded development." His social engagements were numerous and pressing. Often he had not time, between afternoon tea in one dormitory and a birthday spread in another, to scamper home for the plain parenthesis of a dog-biscuit dinner. Sometimes we would hear our truant, in the small hours, drop down upon the porch with a thud of utter exhaustion, and would learn by degrees, during the next day or two, that he had gone with a botany or geology class on a long morning tramp, played hare and hounds with one of the athletic teams all the afternoon and paraded the town till midnight with a serenading party. Often in the spring weather we would not set eyes on him for two days running, or might, perhaps, catch a passing glimpse of our collie standing expectant on the stone wall by the East Lodge, watching the stream of girls and waiting for his next invitation. He would dutifully greet us with a bark and a caper and, if we were driving, jump down to follow the carriage, but if one of his student chums came tripping along and threw her arms about him, showering kisses on his sunny head, Sigurd would flourish his tail in rapturous response and off the two would race to "Math." or "Lit." or "Chem." or "Comp." or whatever other branch of knowledge Young America cannot spare breath to pronounce.
We would often see him lying impartially across the knees of a group of girls studying together in some green nook, his plume waving in the faces clustered over Horace or Livy. He had nothing but admiration for such guileless renderings as "The swift hunter pursuing the leper" or "He landed his boats in the sea," and the harder these latter-day Humanists hugged him, the more he sneezed and yawned in a very embarrassment of joy, though when, absorbed in subjunctives, they pinched his silky ears a trifle too hard, he would quietly withdraw and hunt up a stick for them to throw for Sigurd. Not all his mates were wise in their good-will. They would pick up and toss, for him to chase and worry, rough-broken, splintery pieces of painted board or anything that came handy, and presently a lugubrious dog would appear before his family, laying at our feet, perhaps, a well-licked strip of picket fence, and lifting for our ministrations a bleeding mouth, where the red was mingled with a stain of sickly green.
Sigurd took all manner of liberties even with seniors. At home, though he would gaze into the refrigerator with deep interest, he never ventured to insert so much as his nose, and though a dish of candies might be standing on a low table easily in reach, he merely looked and waggled. Only once, on a Tophet-hot afternoon, while a guest, absorbed in talk, sat oblivious of the plate of ice-cream melting on her knee, did Sigurd slip in his craving tongue and accelerate the process. But with the college girls he knew no such restraints. He was familiar with all their chafing-dish corners and, entering by any door he found ajar, he would help himself to a lunch of fudge and wafers before looking about to choose the softest heap of couch cushions for his nap. When a cut foot made walking painful, he would prevail upon the girls to carry him, great fellow that he was, and we would sometimes come upon him dangling across a slender hand-chair, while his panting bearers struggled up the hill to College Hall. On seeing us, he would scramble down and sheepishly make off with an exaggerated limp. Once we chanced on a group of freshmen holding a picnic party with King Sigurd enthroned on a mossy log in the center, his gilt-paper crown tipped rakishly over one eye. He delighted in picnics, cross-country walks, the May-day frolic on the campus, and constantly imperiled his life by frisking about on tennis court, golf links and archery fields. The girls would use him as a postman, sending him from one to another with notes, not always delivered, swinging from his collar, and he often appeared at the door of a college fair or other festivity wearing the ticket which some lavish chum had bought for him. He was about the college grounds and buildings so much that we feared he might become a nuisance, as well as depart from the few principles of collie conduct we had labored to instill. Much to his indignation, therefore, we made him address to the students, through the columns of our little college weekly,
A DOGGEREL PETITIONSigurd begs to say to his friendsThat for certain inscrutable ends,Quite apart from his own sweet way,There are laws he ought to obey;And because the sight of a girlPuts the tip of his tail in a curl,And sends, with a pit-a-pat start,The commandments out of his heart,He has to entreat you shouldAll help poor Sigurd be good.'Tisn't easy to choke one's barks,With squirrels making remarks;'Tisn't easy to travel homeWith girls enticing to roam.All nice things seem to be naughty;So it's not that Sigurd's grown haughty,When he meets you at eve on the meadow,A yellow scud in the shadow,And passes your grocery bagWith only a wistful wag.The New Year's good resolutions,If broken, bring retributions;So Sigurd beseeches—'tis hard—That you shouldn't call him off guard;Nor tempt that inquisitive rover,That affectionate follower, overThe threshold of College Hall;Nor let him trustfully sprawlIn the pathway of many feet.And don't, though the sin is sweet,Don't, for the gleam of his eyes,His expectant ears' uprise,For his nose's coaxing nudge,Feed Sigurd infinite fudge.
A DOGGEREL PETITION
A DOGGEREL PETITION
Sigurd begs to say to his friendsThat for certain inscrutable ends,Quite apart from his own sweet way,There are laws he ought to obey;And because the sight of a girlPuts the tip of his tail in a curl,And sends, with a pit-a-pat start,The commandments out of his heart,He has to entreat you shouldAll help poor Sigurd be good.'Tisn't easy to choke one's barks,With squirrels making remarks;'Tisn't easy to travel homeWith girls enticing to roam.All nice things seem to be naughty;So it's not that Sigurd's grown haughty,When he meets you at eve on the meadow,A yellow scud in the shadow,And passes your grocery bagWith only a wistful wag.The New Year's good resolutions,If broken, bring retributions;So Sigurd beseeches—'tis hard—That you shouldn't call him off guard;Nor tempt that inquisitive rover,That affectionate follower, overThe threshold of College Hall;Nor let him trustfully sprawlIn the pathway of many feet.And don't, though the sin is sweet,Don't, for the gleam of his eyes,His expectant ears' uprise,For his nose's coaxing nudge,Feed Sigurd infinite fudge.
Sigurd begs to say to his friends
That for certain inscrutable ends,
Quite apart from his own sweet way,
There are laws he ought to obey;
And because the sight of a girl
Puts the tip of his tail in a curl,
And sends, with a pit-a-pat start,
The commandments out of his heart,
He has to entreat you should
All help poor Sigurd be good.
'Tisn't easy to choke one's barks,
With squirrels making remarks;
'Tisn't easy to travel home
With girls enticing to roam.
All nice things seem to be naughty;
So it's not that Sigurd's grown haughty,
When he meets you at eve on the meadow,
A yellow scud in the shadow,
And passes your grocery bag
With only a wistful wag.
The New Year's good resolutions,
If broken, bring retributions;
So Sigurd beseeches—'tis hard—
That you shouldn't call him off guard;
Nor tempt that inquisitive rover,
That affectionate follower, over
The threshold of College Hall;
Nor let him trustfully sprawl
In the pathway of many feet.
And don't, though the sin is sweet,
Don't, for the gleam of his eyes,
His expectant ears' uprise,
For his nose's coaxing nudge,
Feed Sigurd infinite fudge.
That helped him through with one generation of college girls, but after three or four years a fresh appeal had to be made, especially in view of the fact that Sigurd had suddenly resumed the dangerous trick, first taken up on his wild scampers with Laddie, of jumping at horses' heads, and we found some of his younger classmates, for Sigurd belonged to every class in turn, encouraging him in it, because he was "so pretty" in his leaps. Hence once more he reluctantly lapsed into verse and recommended to his intimates
A NOSTRUM FOR SIGURDIt is wrong to springAt a horse's nose;At that quivery thingIt is wrong to spring.With tail for a wingI may chase the crows,But 'tis wrong to springAt a horse's nose.Call me back from the horsesWithno,no,noes;When I try snap coursesCall me back from the horses.Though my remorse isA transient pose,Call me back from the horsesWithno,no,noes.I'm only a collie,As Wellesley knows;Though ever so jollyI'm only a collie.Save Sigurd from folly,For folly has foes,And I'm only a collie,As Wellesley knows.
A NOSTRUM FOR SIGURD
A NOSTRUM FOR SIGURD
It is wrong to springAt a horse's nose;At that quivery thingIt is wrong to spring.With tail for a wingI may chase the crows,But 'tis wrong to springAt a horse's nose.
It is wrong to spring
At a horse's nose;
At that quivery thing
It is wrong to spring.
With tail for a wing
I may chase the crows,
But 'tis wrong to spring
At a horse's nose.
Call me back from the horsesWithno,no,noes;When I try snap coursesCall me back from the horses.Though my remorse isA transient pose,Call me back from the horsesWithno,no,noes.
Call me back from the horses
Withno,no,noes;
When I try snap courses
Call me back from the horses.
Though my remorse is
A transient pose,
Call me back from the horses
Withno,no,noes.
I'm only a collie,As Wellesley knows;Though ever so jollyI'm only a collie.Save Sigurd from folly,For folly has foes,And I'm only a collie,As Wellesley knows.
I'm only a collie,
As Wellesley knows;
Though ever so jolly
I'm only a collie.
Save Sigurd from folly,
For folly has foes,
And I'm only a collie,
As Wellesley knows.
There was a perilous season, after a village Airedale had unadvisedly nipped a teasing small boy, when our hysterical local legislation ordered all dogs into muzzles, commanding the police to shoot at sight any canine wayfarer not so equipped. Sigurd, of course, detested his muzzle and though he would sulkily fetch it when he saw us making ready for a walk, he would growl at it and worry it until we had it snapped on, when he would often turn mournfully back from the door or lie down before it literally in flat rebellion, rather than take the air under such humiliating and uncomfortable conditions. He soon began to exercise his ingenuity, however, in the getting rid of that encumbrance, and again and again, having gone forth a model of compliance with the law, he would come bounding back, muzzleless, triumphant, expecting congratulations. It was hard to find a make of muzzle that he could not push off with his paws or scrape off under a fence or rub off between close-growing trees, and impossible to find one that he could not coax his compassionate girl-chums to take off for him. Melted by his pleading whines, they would slip the muzzle down from his jaws so that he wore it as a pendant over his white vest, a compromise that perplexed our honest college policeman, who, Sigurd's neighbor and friend, solved the problem by consistently turning his back and refusing to see the dog at all. But one well-nigh fatal day a special officer, called in by our stern selectmen for the purpose of hunting down all lawless dogs, beheld Sigurd disporting himself in the public road, his muzzle, as so often, gayly flapping under his chin. According to the man's bewildered account, no sooner had he drawn his revolver and taken good aim at the offender, than "a mob of girls, coming from nowhere and everywhere," suddenly enveloped his intended victim and swept the dog off in their midst to the campus. But the officer had a determined jaw of his own. He kept watch for that fawn collie and the next time he caught sight of Sigurd, again with a swinging muzzle, he ran a rope through our poor boy's collar and was dragging him off to the town lockup and execution ground when again an excited throng of nymphs blocked the way.
"How can you be so cruel?" blazed one of Sigurd's fondest playmates, as a dozen arms were thrown about the collie.
"I'm no rougher with that there dog than he is with me," protested the young officer, purple not only through embarrassment but from the tug of war in which he and Sigurd had been matching strength. "He may be your college pet, but his manners ain't no-way ladylike."
Meanwhile one of the girlish hands caressing Sigurd's neck must have succeeded in slipping a buckle, for suddenly his head shot back through the collar, left as a keepsake to the dog-catcher, and our innocent was far on his way toward the safe shelter of home.
This period of persecution extended over some months, for the muzzles had a bad effect on dog tempers and there were more cases of snapping and nipping than the town, in Sigurd's lifetime, had ever known, though no trace of rabies was detected. It was an anxious season for dog-owners. Our neighboring professor of psychology, she who specialized in spaniels, was overheard by a guest one evening wearily informing a new litter of eight:
"Puppies, this has been a sad day. This morning your ma bit the postman, and this afternoon your pa bit the doctor."
It was a relief to many households when at last the selectmen put their minds on something else.
Although Sigurd was a member of all classes, as well as faculty, and of all societies, he bore, as mascot, a special relation to the Class of 1911, whose color he wore by grace of nature. Glorious he was to behold on Field Day, his coat, well brushed for the occasion, glistening in the sun, a great bow of yellow ribbon standing out like a butterfly from the top of his collar, wagging all over with joyous self-importance as he stood in the front rank of his class, impartially barking applause for both their triumphs and defeats.
With him, as with the girls, the spring term was the climax of the college year, though not precisely an academic climax. Sigurd still found time to drop in at a lecture occasionally, flumping down beside some favorite fellow-student for a brief repose and rousing now and then to thrust up a sentimental paw for a shake. But he had many class-meetings to attend, where, when "Further Remarks" were called for, he has been known to respond with a loud bark,—a recognized indecorum in the college buildings. But on the whole, he kept the rules save in so far as he might be considered "a musical instrument" in use "out of recreation hours."
The spring term bloomed out in guests like crocuses and Sigurd made a point of attending as many as possible of the luncheons and teas given in their honor. An English lady, a poet and a visionary, a presence like a flame, was one afternoon addressing a choice assemblage in our oriental parlor on the mysteries of the Bahist faith. A torch-bearer of the Persian prophet, she was telling of her first interview with Ali Baha on Mount Carmel.
"And the Master greeted me thus: 'O Child of the Kingdom!'"——
Bumpwent something against the door, which swung wide, admitting Sigurd, who saluted the company with a comprehensive wave of his tail.
"You beautiful creature!" cried the Englishwoman, winning him to her with an outstretched hand, "I am sureyouare a Child of the Kingdom," and Sigurd wagged, came up for a pat and dropped down at her feet to slumber out the rest of her impassioned discourse, waking promptly with the arrival of refreshments.
But our Child of the Kingdom, on the very day after he had received this accolade, came home to dinner, for which he had no appetite, not only with a deep scratch, inflicted by the claw of some profane, anti-Bahist cat, down one side of his face, but with his white and golden hair all matted in brown streaks and patches, in witness that a freshman saucepan had spilled its fudge upon him. Where he could get at himself to lick, he enjoyed it very much, but he was deplorably sticky on top.
In the spring, too, there were more dogs about the campus, and battles were frequent. In the interests of academic fellowship we did our best to steer Sigurd clear of encounters with professorial champions, especially Jerry, an Irish terrier who would fight with his own shadow rather than not fight at all, but one morning our chapel vestibule was the scene of an encounter that Isaac Watts might well have called horrendous.
The aggressor was Coco, a fierce little Boston bull and the pride of one of the town's most honored citizens. Coco fought by method and a very effective method it was. He would sneak up to his chosen antagonist, fly at the forehead, tear the flesh so that the streaming blood blinded his enemy and then try for a grip on the throat. Half the dogs in the village already bore Coco's mark when, one March morning, Joy-of-Life and I went in to chapel, leaving Sigurd, as usual, to wait for us outside. As a dog, whom we did not pause to identify, was trotting down the avenue, we laid strict injunctions on Sigurd not to get into a scrap.
The organ was calling all hearts to worship, and heads were already bowed, when suddenly Sigurd, his earnest eyes trying in vain to explain his difficulties, pressed in against our knees. This was a grave breach of chapel decorum, and Joy-of-Life, rising instantly, led him down the aisle. As she opened the door into the vestibule, Coco was upon him, and the snarling fury of a dog-fight jarred against the solemn strains of the organ. I slipped out to find Coco hanging from Sigurd's throat, and Sigurd, blood streaming from his forehead over his face, so hampered by a ring of hands pulling on his collar that he could only snap his jaws in air, unable to see or reach his foe. The choir, arrayed for the processional, had broken line and were banging Coco with hymn books, while everybody was wildly issuing orders to everybody else.
"Let the dogs alone, girls. Look out for yourselves."
"Let Sigurd go. Give him a chance to fight."
"Choke Coco off."
"Twist Coco's tail."
"Bring water."
"Don'tput your hands between them, girls. Keep away."
The janitor, the only man on the scene, had discreetly climbed into a high window-seat, and it was one of the slenderest, most flowerlike maidens there who finally jerked a half-strangled Coco loose and flung him forth from the sacred portals. The choir promptly reformed in rank and, a trifle flushed and disheveled but chanting more lustily than ever, swung up the aisle with the air of the Church Militant. Only the few who were slightly bitten remained behind to be conducted by Joy-of-Life to the hospital for immediate attention to their wounds, while Sigurd and I made for home, marking the trail with our blood. No real harm was done. Coco's owner, though secretly convinced that Sigurd did all the biting, insisted on paying the doctor's bills and, a few days after the encounter, Sigurd, with a scarred forehead, welcomed his injured defenders to a dinner-party, at which I presided with my arm in a sling. Sigurd seemed to feel a dim responsibility for that hurt of mine and, as long as I wore a bandage, would come up at intervals to give it a penitent lick.
At all the festivals of the spring term Sigurd deemed his attendance indispensable. He fell in with the parades, frisked out into the midst of the campus dances, and once, at least, took a conspicuous part in the Tree Day pageant. A graceful, carmine-clad Narcissus had died to slow music on the bank of Longfellow Fountain. The wood-nymphs and water-nymphs, Diana and her train, even the hilltop Oreads had tripped off the sylvan stage, but the audience, massed on the other side of the pool, refused to take the hint and, instead of breaking up, still sat spell-bound, their gaze fastened on poor Narcissus, who, cramped in the dying attitude, could not conceive any dramatic way of coming to life again. So we bade Sigurd: "Go find," and after two false starts, once for a squirrel and once for a stick, he sped straight for Narcissus and, anxiously thrusting his nose into her face, recognized a special friend and broke into loud barks of joy, while, throwing her arm about him, she sprang no less gladly to her feet. The audience thought it all a part of the pageant, the prevailing opinion being that Sigurd was playing the rôle of Cerberus and welcoming Narcissus to Hades.
But for all his years of enthusiastic college attendance, Sigurd never took a degree. Not even his own Class of 1911 was allowed to carry out its design of dressing their mascot in a specially made cap and gown and leading him with them in the Commencement procession. His B.A. stood only for Beloved Animal.
TO SIGURD
Not one blithe leap of welcome? Can you lieUnder this woodland mold,More stillThan broken daffodil,When I,Home from too long a roving,Come up the silent hill?Dear, wistful eyes,White ruff and windy goldOf collie coat so oft caressed,Not one quick thrillIn snowy breast,One spring of jubilant surprise,One ecstasy of loving?Are all our frolics ended? Never moreThose royal romps of old,When one,Playfellow of the sun,Would pourAdventures and romancesInto a morning run;Off and away,A flying glint of gold,Startling to wing a husky choirOf crows whose dunShadows would tireEven that wild speed? Unscared to-dayThey hold their weird seances.Ever you dreamed, legs twitching, you would catchA crow, O leaper bold,Next time,Or chase to branch sublimeThat batchOf squirrels daring captureIn saucy pantomime;Till one spring dawn,Resting amid the goldOf crocuses, Death stole on youFrom that far climeWhere dreams come true,And left upon the starry lawnYour form without your rapture.And was Death's whistle then so wondrous sweetAcross the glimmering woldThat youWould trustfully pursueStrange feet?When I was gone, each morrowYou sought our old haunts through,Slower to play,Drooping in faded gold.Now it is mine to grieve and missMy comrade true,Who used to kissWith eager tongue such tears away,Coaxing a smile from sorrow.I know not what life is, nor what is death,Nor how vast Heaven may holdAll thisEarth-beauty and earth-bliss.Christ saithThat not a sparrow falleth—O songs of sparrow faith!—But God is there.May not a leap of goldYet greet me on some gladder hill,A shining wraith,Rejoicing still,As in those hours we found so fair,To follow where love calleth?
Not one blithe leap of welcome? Can you lieUnder this woodland mold,More stillThan broken daffodil,When I,Home from too long a roving,Come up the silent hill?Dear, wistful eyes,White ruff and windy goldOf collie coat so oft caressed,Not one quick thrillIn snowy breast,One spring of jubilant surprise,One ecstasy of loving?
Not one blithe leap of welcome? Can you lie
Under this woodland mold,
More still
Than broken daffodil,
When I,
Home from too long a roving,
Come up the silent hill?
Dear, wistful eyes,
White ruff and windy gold
Of collie coat so oft caressed,
Not one quick thrill
In snowy breast,
One spring of jubilant surprise,
One ecstasy of loving?
Are all our frolics ended? Never moreThose royal romps of old,When one,Playfellow of the sun,Would pourAdventures and romancesInto a morning run;Off and away,A flying glint of gold,Startling to wing a husky choirOf crows whose dunShadows would tireEven that wild speed? Unscared to-dayThey hold their weird seances.
Are all our frolics ended? Never more
Those royal romps of old,
When one,
Playfellow of the sun,
Would pour
Adventures and romances
Into a morning run;
Off and away,
A flying glint of gold,
Startling to wing a husky choir
Of crows whose dun
Shadows would tire
Even that wild speed? Unscared to-day
They hold their weird seances.
Ever you dreamed, legs twitching, you would catchA crow, O leaper bold,Next time,Or chase to branch sublimeThat batchOf squirrels daring captureIn saucy pantomime;Till one spring dawn,Resting amid the goldOf crocuses, Death stole on youFrom that far climeWhere dreams come true,And left upon the starry lawnYour form without your rapture.
Ever you dreamed, legs twitching, you would catch
A crow, O leaper bold,
Next time,
Or chase to branch sublime
That batch
Of squirrels daring capture
In saucy pantomime;
Till one spring dawn,
Resting amid the gold
Of crocuses, Death stole on you
From that far clime
Where dreams come true,
And left upon the starry lawn
Your form without your rapture.
And was Death's whistle then so wondrous sweetAcross the glimmering woldThat youWould trustfully pursueStrange feet?When I was gone, each morrowYou sought our old haunts through,Slower to play,Drooping in faded gold.Now it is mine to grieve and missMy comrade true,Who used to kissWith eager tongue such tears away,Coaxing a smile from sorrow.
And was Death's whistle then so wondrous sweet
Across the glimmering wold
That you
Would trustfully pursue
Strange feet?
When I was gone, each morrow
You sought our old haunts through,
Slower to play,
Drooping in faded gold.
Now it is mine to grieve and miss
My comrade true,
Who used to kiss
With eager tongue such tears away,
Coaxing a smile from sorrow.
I know not what life is, nor what is death,Nor how vast Heaven may holdAll thisEarth-beauty and earth-bliss.Christ saithThat not a sparrow falleth—O songs of sparrow faith!—But God is there.May not a leap of goldYet greet me on some gladder hill,A shining wraith,Rejoicing still,As in those hours we found so fair,To follow where love calleth?
I know not what life is, nor what is death,
Nor how vast Heaven may hold
All this
Earth-beauty and earth-bliss.
Christ saith
That not a sparrow falleth
—O songs of sparrow faith!—
But God is there.
May not a leap of gold
Yet greet me on some gladder hill,
A shining wraith,
Rejoicing still,
As in those hours we found so fair,
To follow where love calleth?
FAREWELLS
"The door of Death is made of gold,That mortal eyes cannot behold."
"The door of Death is made of gold,That mortal eyes cannot behold."
"The door of Death is made of gold,That mortal eyes cannot behold."
"The door of Death is made of gold,
That mortal eyes cannot behold."
—Blake'sDedication to Queen Charlotte.
We were slow to realize that Sigurd was having too many birthdays. That guardian figure stretched out on the south porch just above the steps, shining like an embodied welcome, had become a part of life itself. Indeed, a caller, not famed for tact, after surveying our Volsung for some time in silence, dropped the cryptic remark: "How much a dog comes to look like the family!" Brightening our busy months with golden glints of romp and mischief and caress, he kept his run of birthdays like festivals which brought no warning with them.
They were celebrated with becoming pomp, with much-wrapped gifts that he rejoiced to open himself and often with a yellow tea. As his taste inclined to broad and simple effects, there would be a giant sunflower in the center of the table, with strips of goldenrod emanating from it like rays. The guests, his best-beloved of all ages and conditions, would drink Sigurd's health in orangeade and feast in his honor on sponge cake. From the day of Poor Ellen to that of Housewife Honeyvoice, Amelia, a young and comely Irish Protestant, reigned in the kitchen and made it her pride to celebrate Sigurd's anniversaries with all due splendor, though even then she would not intermit the daily scoldings to which she attributed his very gradual growth in grace. For still he would run away at intervals and wallow in all iniquity. If the prodigal returned by daylight and found us together, he would disport himself at our feet in a brief agony of penitence. As he lay on his back, writhing with remorse and apparently trying to clasp his paws in supplication, we would reproach him, to the accompaniment of his hollow groans, until our gravity would break down. Then he would cheerfully scramble up and fetch us his latest rubber toy, with a coaxing invitation to let bygones be bygones and have a frisk with Sigurd. If he came home under cover of darkness, he would shamelessly go straight to his own piazza corner, venting an indignant grunt, like an outraged man of the house, if he found his supper soggy and his bed not made.
The birthday teas, though they brought so many of his friends across the threshold, were not an unmixed joy to Sigurd. The flaunting bow of new, stiff, yellow ribbon tickled his ears, until he had succeeded in working it around, a rumpled knot, under his chin, and worse yet were the wreaths of yellow wild flowers that the small fingers of some of his child neighbors had woven for his neck. His share of his own birthday cake, too, was more hygienically apportioned than he approved. What is a speck of yellow frosting on a collie's long red tongue? But Amelia saw to it that his birthday dinner was after his own heart,—fresh corncake, rice and liver, while now and then some devoted sophomore, even though the long vacation had put a thousand miles between them, would send him a home-made chocolate cream as large as a saucer, at which he was allowed only to sniff and nibble.
We may have noticed that Sigurd's girth was ampler and his bearing more sedate than in his younger days, but still he was the first in every frolic and almost as fleet as a deer. He roused one at the edge of the woods one morning when he was out for an early airing with Joy-of-Life and chased it across the meadows so fast and far that she was in dismay lest he overtake the beautiful creature and pull it down. Even to the last he would let no dog pass him. His frankest admirer and fellow-runner through his sunset years was a simple-minded young collie whom Sigurd would outwit by wheeling sharply, when he felt Sandy gaining on him, and making off at right angles while the precipitate pursuer sped on for some distance in the old direction. But the goal was what Sigurd chose to make it, and Sandy, bewildered by these subtle tactics, always believed himself outrun.
We had come to regard a walk without Sigurd as hardly a walk at all. Perhaps we observed that he found the heat, which brought out his tormenting eczema, a little harder to bear from summer to summer, but our crisp, crackling winters revived him to all manner of puppy antics. I remember, like a picture, one frosty afternoon, the evergreens festooned with ice, while the leafless trees, struck by the level rays of the western sun, glistened with rainbow crystals. Through this enchanted world, as through the heart of a diamond, Joy-of-Life and Sigurd were coming home. Sigurd, barking his glad music, was bounding hither and thither over the sparkling crust, now trying to fulfill his contract to keep all chickadees and nut-hatches, blue jays and juncos, from alighting on the earth, and now convinced that at last the moment had come when he was to realize his supreme ambition, inherited from Ralph, and catch a crow. Their sardonic caws above his head, as they flapped heavily from pine to pine, made him so furious that he would pounce on their black, sliding shadows, while Joy-of-Life, her cheeks apple-bright with the cold, laughed at him so merrily that he took it for applause.
Yet change was busy about our collie, who welcomed no changes but loved his world exactly as it was. We sold the first home and moved into a more spacious one that we had built on a strip of untamed land hard by. Then a street came, and more houses, and quietly the wildwood drew away from us. Within our own bounds, at least, we strove to keep the forest growth in its own careless beauty, but never a man stepped on the place, brother or guest or gardener or state warden or whosoever, but, driven by the deep instinct of the pioneer, he must needs go stealthily forth with ax or saw or shears and lay about him in our happy tangle. The worst of it was that we had to appear grateful.
Sigurd accepted his new abode with but a passing bewilderment. Racing up from the train on his return from a summer in the mountains with Joy-of-Life, he was whistled into the Scarab while yet too utterly absorbed in the rapture of his greetings to heed where he was. After a little he looked about him in obvious surprise and perplexity and set out at once on a tour of investigation, trotting from cellar to attic, nosing into the closets and under the shelves, sniffing at the familiar desks and bookcases and recognizing with a wag his own chair and rug. As soon as might be he was out of doors, examining porches and paths. Then he crossed the intervening bit of wilderness, granite ledge matted over with the red-berried kinnikinic, and woofed for admittance at his accustomed door. He was kindly received and allowed to go about as he liked, upstairs and downstairs and into my lord's chamber, but the furniture was not his furniture, the smells were not his smells, and within ten minutes he had quitted those rooms, scene of so many puppy exploits, to enter them no more. He knew the difference between house and home.
Yet our new holding did not seem to Sigurd nor to us entirely natural until he had cut one of his unfortunate paws on a broken bottle left by the carpenters as a souvenir and had strewn steps and driveway and lawn with shreds of cotton bandages and adhesive plaster. "When is a clutter not a clutter?" asked my mother, and answered her own conundrum: "When Sigurd does it."
In a snug corner against the south wall of the Scarab stood a massive and elegant erection, with gable roof and olive-green door, that only the unsophisticated called a kennel. It was "Sigurd's House," and as such he accepted it, counting its artistically shingled walls and heavy layers of sheathing paper no more than his just deserts. He delighted in its deep bed of fresh straw which tickled him most agreeably as he rolled over and over in it. He found it an exciting by-play, too, to dash in with stick or bone and lose it under his bedding, which he would proceed to scratch up with all the fury of a New England matron in housecleaning time. Then he would come swaggering out with the air of duty done, shaking his own skin. Sigurd's House was such a palace that the children of the neighborhood liked to play in it, but our collie deemed this high trespass and, from the screened study porch, would roar indignant protest when five or six chubby tots, with that saucy black spaniel, Curly, would all squeeze in together.
To the Scarab came new friends for Sigurd with new caresses, to which he always made cordial and courteous response. Amelia crossed the ocean to a waiting bridegroom and a happy home of her own, but Housewife Honey-voice, with her little Esther, petted Sigurd even more devotedly.
Sigurd's only difficulty with Housewife Honey-voice, the only shadow on their sympathy, arose from the delicacy of her appetite by which she was inclined, at first, to measure his. When her enthusiasm and culinary skill persuaded the family to go on a vegetable diet, Sigurd gave us clearly to understand that we need not count him in. And when I came home, one evening, from a week's motor trip, Sigurd barely waited for his customary chant of welcome before gripping my dress and leading me to the refrigerator.
"Hasn't Sigurd had his dinner yet?"
"Why, yes, an hour ago."
"Nonsense, boy! You're not hungry. Nobody is hungry just after dinner."
"What a whopper!" sighed Sigurd, as he pattered after me back to the study.
No sooner had I turned my attention to the accumulation of letters on my desk than again Sigurd pulled gently, yet with determination, at my skirt and insisted on a second promenade to the refrigerator.
"He really is hungry. How much have you been giving him for dinner?"
But when I saw the measure, I heaped his plate, while he eagerly watched the process, waving his tail in triumph, but hurrying once across the kitchen to snuggle his head against the knee of Housewife Honey-voice, looking up at her with those comprehending, trustful eyes that said:
"You didn'tmeanto starve dear Sigurd, and now that you know how big my hollow is, it will be all right forever."
Every autumn a new horde of freshmen fell in love with him and visiting alumnæ embraced him in mid-campus. Toward the Freshman Twins, who gladdened the Scarab one year, he conducted himself like a sophomore, humoring their childish ways, guiding them through the college labyrinth, serving as a towel for their homesick tears and partaking freely of their consoling fudge, but all with a comical air of condescension. He was himself accustomed to the best society, even seniors. Our gracious college president made him welcome to her veranda, as she sat at tea among her roses; a beloved frequenter of the Scarab, Hoops-of-Steel, though clinging to her preference for boys, accorded him a true if tempered friendship; and even Scholar Carol, our fifteenth-century historian, who affected the fireside sphinx and had named a particularly gallant kitten Eddy IV, counted him only a little lower than a cat. As for the children on our hill, they hugged him to the limit of endurance. His warmest admirer among them was Wee-wee, a rosy bunch of unweariable energy, who, when she came to us of an afternoon in order to give her exhausted parents a brief respite, would wear out the entire family as, one by one, we undertook to amuse her, and would finally fling herself upon Sigurd, riding on his back, rolling him over and over and examining his paws with an envious admiration that broke forth in the remark: "Wen I'm old and big like Sigurd, maybe I'll have feet onmyhands."
For two lively years a brace of graduate students, Cherub and Seraph, folded their wings beneath the Scarab rooftree. Cherub was a bit afraid, at first, of "that bouncing yellow elephant," but Seraph instantly became Sigurd's very pink of playmates. Every morning they would start off early for the college library, scampering across the landscape at a rate that sent the sparrows fluttering from their path like so many irregular verbs. Between the meadow and the campus is a perilous stretch of railway tracks and trolley tracks, and here Sigurd would assume full charge of his companion. If the whistle of an engine, as they drew near the crossing, cut the air, Sigurd would leap upon her and, with his paws upon her breast, hold her back until the train had hurtled by, when he would lead her triumphantly across under the trailing plume of smoke. Every autumnal Sunday they spent hours together in the woods, from which the Seraph would bring home gentians, wych-hazel and a lyric, and Sigurd a ruff all tangled up with burrs. Winter did not daunt their zeal. They formed themselves into a rescue expedition and saved from the frost all manner of wild-flower roots, which the Seraph arranged in rows of pots placed on boards stretched from a little table in her room to her south window. Alas for sweet Saint Charity! There came a day when Sigurd, wishing to study the scenery to verify a suspicion of a dog burglar after his treasure-trove of bones, sprang up and struck his forefeet on the edge of the nearest board with such violence that the whole structure came crashing down, enveloping him in a flying ruin of pots and plants and earth and water. He did not stay to help the Seraph clear up the landslide, but remembered a pressing engagement in the remotest corner of the attic.
Through December these happy comrades explored the fringes of the forest for glowing vines to serve as Christmas decorations, and in the whirling snowstorms of a peculiarly ferocious little February they would come romping home, two white objects plunging through the drifts, looking like Peary and one of his huskies just back from the North Pole. Joy-of-Life had been in Egypt that winter, seeking health after a grave illness, but she came again with April, more welcome than the spring. Sigurd bounded to her shoulders in ecstasy of greeting, his coat ruddy in the sun. He shone more than ever with a supreme content as he sat erect between us while we motored through the miracle of May, under red-budded maples and oaks whose baby leaves, while the orioles shouted to them to hurry up, where trembling from misty pink to golden green. He did not care to run with the machine, however slowly it was driven, but saved his energies for the long rambles with the Seraph, as she went questing for anemone and dogwood, bellwort, violets, columbine, lady slippers and all
"our shining little sistersOf the forest and the fields."
"our shining little sistersOf the forest and the fields."
"our shining little sisters
Of the forest and the fields."
As the days grew warmer, he would forget the admonitions of previous springs and all his good resolutions, and take a roll, now and then, to Sister Jane's wrath and anguish, in a bed of jonquils or yellow tulips, claiming that their color made them his by royal right. When we scolded him, he took refuge with the Seraph, though even she was causing him bitter annoyance, as June and Commencement drew near, by her attentions to a fuzzy puppy, Puck, whom she visited almost daily at collie kennels two miles away. He was a prize puppy and it disgusted Sigurd beyond barks to see the fuss we all made over certain dog-show awards that Puck gave the Seraph to bring home, a green ribbon not worth the chewing and anemptycut-glass vase. When Puck, on the eve of Seraph's departure, was himself brought to the Scarab and a journeying basket was equipped for him, Sigurd sulked in the shabby depths of his dear old chair. All the small folk of our neighborhood flocked in to pat Puppy Ki-yi, as Joy-of-Life and I privily dubbed our guest, but only Wee-wee, whose own name for the mite was "Minister—Ittle Teeny Minister, coz he stan's on his back legs an' jiggles his arms an' pweaches at us," divined Sigurd's jealous misery. She snuggled down in the chair beside him, hugging the yellow ball into which he had rolled himself and solicitously explaining that "Minister is the best 'ittle dog, and Sigurd is the best gweatbigdog," but the Volsung did not care for a divided homage and shook his ears at all puppy worshipers.
Then the Seraph disappeared, as all his student lovers, one after another, would disappear. Letters came back to him and gifts, but he could not puzzle out what these had to do with the dancing playmate no longer to be found on hillside or by lake. Nor could he foresee the day when that ridiculous Puck, grown into a noble collie, would in his turn sorely miss the Seraph, who had sailed away, on the ship that bore another of Sigurd's most devoted Wellesley lassies, to France. There were dogs on that ship, Professor Peggy and her scarred comrades, veterans of war, that had been sent over, like wounded French officers, to instruct, and were now returning to duty at the front. But Puck, too old for the Red Cross training, was left behind, sniffing up and down the garden paths in patient search for his dainty mistress, who, arrayed in gas-mask and trench-helmet, was serving from a battered camionette hot coffee and cocoa to our boys in khaki just behind the trenches.
In the Orchard, too, the venerable Cousin for whom Sigurd since puppyhood had cherished a romantic attachment, the white-haired inamorata whom he would run to meet with his most grotesque waggle, was no longer to be found in the familiar nooks from which Laddie had long since disappeared. And now that the all-beloved Elder Sister lay mortally ill, Sigurd pattered over day after day to look in at the sickroom and invite a stroking from the delicate hand that would rest so languidly upon his lifted head. Sometimes he carried her a yellow chrysanthemum or a cluster of cream-colored tea-roses tied to his collar. And when she had passed to Paradise through brain-wandering memories of Italy, as through a vestibule of beauty, Sigurd coaxed long at the closed door, whining softly, calling to his friend, troubled by the silence but incredulous of death.
Because of their vanishing ways, Sigurd had early come to look on college girls in general as an inconstant factor in life and accepted their attentions with the casual air of a confirmed old bachelor, but his faithfulness to his friends of riper age never wavered. Even to the last he always raised for the Lady of Cedar Hill his rapturous lyric cry, though it would sometimes embarrass him by breaking into a hoarse and husky squeak. He had special ways with each of us. He kept one piquant game for my mother, who, while he wagged his tail in ever wilder circles at her, would wag herCongregationalistin exact mockery at him, until he would make a maddened leap and snatch that sacred sheet from her hand.
But he was gentle with old people, even in his frolics, and from the first had felt a certain responsibility for their safety. Joy-of-Life had left him late one afternoon, while he was still a youngster, to guard her mother's nap on the piazza couch, but a white flash of Laddie, temptation incarnate, at the foot of the hill, had sent him careering off into the gloaming. Rising hurriedly to call him back, confused by the sudden waking, his charge had missed her footing in the dusk and fallen down the steps. Her first clear consciousness was of Sigurd standing over her, licking her face and hands with a penitent tongue, nor would he leave her all that evening, lying on the edge of her dress as she sat and trotting close beside her whenever she crossed the room. And when, touched by his concern, she bent to him and said: "I wasn't really hurt, and Sigurd was a good dog to come back," he joyously flopped over on his spine and presented his snowy shirt-front for a forgiving pat.
A household dear to Sigurd was that in which two of our college professors, long retired, dwelt in sisterly affection. He bore himself with the utmost discretion there, as if aware of a dignity and fragility beyond the wont of households. The classicist, whose Greek precision of accent gave beauty to her least remark, would introduce Sigurd to callers from abroad as "one of our most distinguished citizens," while the botanist, prisoned in a hooded chair on wheels,—ah, the feet that had so often and so lightly carried her in a day over twenty miles and more of the green earth she loved!—liked to have him escort her on her pathetic airings. He was not with her, but attending his own family on a drive one day, when we saw in the village square before us a sudden commotion, people running from all sides toward that familiar little carriage, which, rashly left standing at the edge of the curb with its hood open toward the wind, had been overset, so that the poor lady, strapped to the seat, was standing on her bonnet. Sigurd reached her first of all and when, shocked by the jar into a momentary oblivion, she looked up, "it was," she afterward said, "right into the kindest, most reassuring brown eyes in the world," for Sigurd's head was drooping close above her own and all the help that a collie could give beamed in his friendly gaze.
Hints of age began to appear, reluctant though we were to recognize them, in Sigurd himself,—an inclination toward longer and longer naps in his own disreputable chair, an increasing resentment of sweeping days and housecleaning, and a tendency, long after a swollen ear or a sharp attack of eczema was cured and Sigurd, settling his chin on his paws, had dismissed Dr. Vet with a low, majestic sweep of tail, to continue to claim the lazy privileges of an invalid. Sometimes his stiffening limbs failed to fold themselves with the old comfort into the hollow of his chair, and he would look up to us in puzzled appeal. He was a handsome collie still, but his manners had grown more reserved and his bearing more stately. He was no longer excited by Commencement festivities, though he would stroll up to take a look at the Tree Day dances and saunter into the Garden Party, accepting the embraces of old friends and new with an amiability only slightly tinged with boredom. But he loved more and more to bask in the sun on the south porch or to dream, his legs tied into his favorite bowknot, in front of the study fireplace, where Joy-of-Life's annual barrel of Christmas driftwood made the flames look like little rainbows on a holiday.
He was almost ten years old when he was run over by an automobile. Except for a bruised paw he did not seem to be hurt, for he crouched so flat in the road that the machine merely scraped his back, but his nerves were severely shaken. When we came home that noon, he greeted us with a prolonged, strange howl, unlike anything that we had ever heard from him before, and for weeks would not venture out upon the roads without one of us to serve as bodyguard, wheedling until we had to drop our books and devise some respectable excuse for a walk. Left behind at a Greek Letter Society House one evening, he refused to start off for home alone—the bold ranger of a thousand midnights—and his indulgent girl hostesses telephoned for a carriage, so that Sigurd came proudly driving up to his front door in a hack. He so enjoyed the extra petting that came with any mischance that he affected, when it occurred to him, this terror long after it had faded out, just as he would in running tuck up an injured foot, when he happened to think of it, weeks after it was healed, and hop plaintively on three legs until the sight of a cat or a squirrel made him forget all about it.
Sigurd had several promising sons in the village, and one of these we would gladly have adopted had not our delight in its puppy graces nearly broken his jealous old heart. So we let it go to other admirers and presently lost all trace of his golden scions. But one day, when I was walking with him, a winsome little lad came up and, touching his cap, asked shyly if he might stroke Sigurd, "for he's the papa of my dog Trusty that died." Poor Trusty was a victim of distemper, and the child softly told us all about it, his arms about the neck of Sigurd, who put on an appropriate expression of bereavement.
The burden of the years brought its own compensation. Instead of the darkling escapades that used to distract and worry us, Sigurd became the best of company, in the depths of a winter night. Joy-of-Life was the lark of the household, and I the owl, so our self-appointed caretaker, after seeing her early to bed, would come downstairs again to lie close against my feet, inviting confidences. When I became too absorbed in my task to answer his remarks, he would still hold forth in a broken conversational grumble, contented, for reply, with the crackling of the fire and the scratching of a pen.
Nor was Sigurd the only one of our blithe fellowship for whom Time was quietly setting up milestones along the changing road. He was still in his prime when, on a date of gleaming memory, the Dryad gave at Norumbega Hall a birthday party for my mother, a party musical with our Poet's own sweet and roguish songs, not only in honor of