Poor Jack, hanging his head, began to speak of parting with Prince. He had often wished he could put him in pawn with the rest of the pledged goods, and borrow a little money on Prince’s capabilities of keeping guard and ratting. Jack had joked in his half-rueful, half-rough fashion on the dogs not eating his head off, since he could hardly tell on what Prince, together with his master’s family, had fed for the last fortnight. Jack knew very well how he and Prince had gone out, in company and separately, after nightfall and in broad day, on the hunt; how they had constituted themselves amateur chiffonniers, and burrowed in the dust heaps for cast-away fragments; how they had hung about the doors of eating-houses and bakers shops for chance crumbs; how they had picked up garbage and been thankful. But it was one thing to joke and another to dispose, for good and all, of the old dog—he was an old dog now in Jack’s eyes—and that to a customer who was hard-fisted and cross-grained, whose bite and sup Prince would not share, and who could no more be trusted to let old friends meet than he could be expected to redeem the forfeited articles and restore the fallen fortunes of the family gone to the wall. But Jack, who had been, in his humble way, self-willed and extravagant from his cradle, had already parted with more precious possessions than Prince, and it is to be feared would part with still more before his history was ended. Anyhow, he sold Prince for the merest trifle to a hard buyer; and as tears were in Jack’s dull eyes when he closed the bargain, we will dismiss him with the reluctant reflection that, if he or his progenitors had only owned a single germ of noble self-denial, manly, womanly forethought, plucky, cheery diligence, he might not merely have kept the dog—he and his might have been as independent and well-to-do, and risen as far above want, with its terrible temptations, as any of the gentlefolks in the land. The inducement which Prince’s new master, Mr. Jerry Noakes, had for the purchase, was that he had enjoyed some opportunity of remarking Prince’s tenacity of purpose and literal discharge of a commission, which he was convinced would render the dog a good watch; while Mr. Jerry was satisfied, from Prince present appearance, that he could be put off with as shabby quarters and meagre fare as will suffice to keep a dog in life. In fact, Mr. Jerry Noakes’ principle, which he found to work well for his ends, was—don’t pamper your dependants on any consideration, if you wish them to be of use to you—on the contrary, grind them down to the last extremity, and all that is in them will be stimulated to do battle with the world on their and your account.