We spoke just now of Dogs being honest from pure conventionality; there is no doubt that many of them soon acquire a very acute sense of the conventional, and perform certain actions, or assume a certain behaviour, simply because they feel it to be the right and proper thing. We have heard of a Bull-terrier who acquired perfectly that sense of decorum which in many human beings serves in lieu of religious feeling. When this Dog was bought, it was debated whether or not it would be advisable to let him remain in the room at prayers; the question was eventually decided in the affirmative, and the Dog almost immediately seemed to get a sense of what was meant, and to feel that he was expected to behave with propriety. He therefore adopted a particular mode of procedure--a sort of canine ritual--to which he always steadily adhered. While the Bible was being read, he sat straight up on his haunches on the hearth-rug, looking solemnly into the fire. This he continued until the family knelt to pray, when he immediately went off to a corner of the room, and stood there with lowered head until all was over. He did this with such perfect solemnity that the effect was indescribably ludicrous, and friends stopping in the house had to be warned of what to expect. The tales of canine magnanimity are endless. Every one knows that of the big Newfoundland who, being long plagued by a number of little yelping curs, one of whom at last bit him, revenged himself only by dipping the offender in the quay hard by, and, after he was cowed, plunging in and bringing him safe to land. But all Dogs are not magnanimous. Some of them, like certain men one meets with, have quite a talent for taking offence, and will pick a quarrel on the slightest provocation, or, indeed, on no provocation at all. There are, of course, the wretched little curs one meets in the street, whose sole delight seems to be to rush out suddenly and bark furiously at every passer-by; but these miserable beings act as they do rather from lack of brain, and for want of something to do, than from real badness of heart. There are Dogs, however, who are naturally quarrelsome, and will do all in their power to get up a row, simply for the pleasure of the thing. “There is a well-authenticated instance of a Terrier, who, in picking a quarrel, contrived, as if trained in the Kanzellei of Prince Bismarck, to place himself technically in the right. He would time his movements so that some passenger should stumble over him, and would then fasten on the calf of his leg. With a most statesman-like aptitude, he selected the aged, the infirm, and the ill-dressed, as the objects of his cunningly-planned attacks.”[107]