mrs custer and the dogs

Elizabeth Custer (1842-1933), the wife of George Armstrong Custer, had been raised in comfort and privilege as a judge's daughter.  Even so, she readily followed her husband wherever he went on his military career despite the discomforts of travel.  After Custer's death, "Libbie" Custer devoted her energies to his image, publishing popular books on his life and the adventures she had shared with him. From her first, Boots and Saddles (1885), here's a passage about camping on the plains and how the family dogs found the comfiest digs:

While we were all getting accustomed to the new climate, it was of no use to try to keep the dogs out of my tent. They stood around, and eyed me with such reproachful looks if I attempted to tie up the entrance to the tent and leave them out. If it were very cold when I returned from the dining-tent, I found dogs under and on the camp-bed, and so thickly scattered over the floor that I had to step carefully over them to avoid hurting feet or tails. If I secured a place in the bed I was fortunate. Sometimes, when it had rained, and all of them were wet, I rebelled. The steam from their shaggy coats was stifling; but the general begged so hard for them that I taught myself to endure the air at last. I never questioned the right of the half-grown puppies to everything. Our struggles to raise them, and to avoid the distemper which goes so much harder with blooded than with cur dogs, endeared them to us. When I let the little ones in, it was really comical to hear my husband’s arguments and cunningly-devised reasons why the older dogs should follow. A plea was put up for “the hound that had fits;” there was always another that “had been hurt in hunting;” and so on until the tent would hold no more. Fortunately, in pleasant weather, I was let off with only the ill or injured ones for perpetual companions. We were so surrounded with dogs when they were resting after the march, and they slept so soundly from fatigue, that it was difficult to walk about without stepping on them.

-- Custer, Elizabeth Bacon, 1842-1933. "Boots And Saddles": Or, Life In Dakota With General Custer. New York: Harper & brothers, 1885. p. 57.

the cat as doctor

thanks reusableart.com

C. Howard Young suffered from a number of ailments during his life, and even so managed to live a decent span of days (1853-1927).  His 1897 memoir, Sunny Life of an Invalid, isn't as grim as you'd think (a little of it is).  In fact, most of it is chatty, informal, witty and self-deprecating, and appreciative of every comfort that came his way.  He dedicates an entire chapter to "Cats as Doctors: A Debt of Gratitude Paid to Cats."  Here's one of the tribute tales:
* * *
I should allude more at length to the pussy who cared for me at Asbury Park, NJ.
Sitting on the veranda, one summer eve, a poor, woe-be-gone cat slunk by, with pitiful appeals. It was soon to become a mother.
We called it, but in vain. It feared. All men's hands, it felt, were against it. And men's feet, too.
My sister, who had sympathy for all that suffered, always had good influence on all animals. She followed it, and talked soothingly, and soon came back with it. We petted it a few days, and then my sister prepared a bed for it in the woodshed. Large oyster shells were placed around the interesting patient, with various delicacies in them, and the feline population of the United States of America was soon augmented by six.

The next day, that cat appeared in my room with one baby kitten in her mouth. As there was another bed in my room I had it covered with journals. The kitty waited patiently, sprang up, and laid number one on the bed; then emigrated to import the other five kittens.
That cat then took care of the six kittens and myself, and at times brought them over for a visit to my bed. It seemed to regard me as a kind of godfather. Also seemed to regard my bed as possessing superior accommodations for cat housekeeping. "Cast your bread upon the waters." Well, it was this same cat (cats seem to apply the injunction to increase and multiply) that later, with a new family under the stoop, chased away a burglar, by fastening her claws in the calf of his leg at midnight. Possibly, or even probably, she thought the intruder was after her feline family, as well as her adopted human family, but "One good turn deserves another." From the oaths I heard on the veranda, I can see that the burglar felt that one bad turn deserves a scratch. Several!
* * *
Young, C. Howard 1853-1927. Sunny Life of an Invalid. Hartford, Conn.: Press of The Case, Lockwood & Brainard, 1897. pp. 163-4.

a faithful parrot

The American symbolist painter Elihu Vedder (1836-1923) spent part of his childhood in Cuba.  After a while his parents thought the climate too hot for his health, and he was sent back to the care of his grandparents in New York.  As he writes in his memoir The Digressions of V., he left one particular friend behind him:

...I began to look sallow, and was packed off North. But I left one broken heart behind me, that of poor Cottorita, my parrot. She had been given me very young, and loved as only a parrot or dog can love. I have always been sorry that I did not take the dear thing with me, for she went about for three days after my departure, calling, " Nino Elijio! Nino Elijio! " and then flew away and was never seen again. When I went to the Spanish school she would station herself at the house-door and wait patiently until I came back, and then, climbing up, never quitted my shoulder. When I remember that a parrot can live a hundred years, there is no reason why she should not be rubbing a dear old head against my cheek at this present moment. Grandpa's old parrot, who had passed his youth among sailors and who used to ask, "What o'clock?" and when told the time, would reply, "You be damned!" amused me, but never consoled me for the loss of poor Cottorita.

-- Vedder, Elihu, 1836-1923. The Digressions of V.. London: Constable , 19111910.p. 76.

a beautiful dwelling: the skull of a dog

I've got a longer than usual excerpt for you today, because to cut it too much would be to blunt the odd beauty of its thoughts.  In the following passage, artist and essayist Philip Gilbert Hamilton (1834-1894) writes about the skull of a beloved dog that he keeps close to hand.  Though I understand this seems dark to modern sensibilities, the love and respect Hamilton feels for this relic is worth the reading - especially since he grew up an orphan raised by aunts.
* * *
THERE is a little skull amongst the bones I have collected for the study of anatomy, which any slightly scientific person would at once recognise as that of a dog. It is a beautiful little skull, finely developed, and one sees at a glance that the animal, when it was alive, must have possessed more than ordinary intelligence. The scientific lecturer would consider it rather valuable as an illustration of cranial structure in the higher animals; he might compare it with the skull of a crocodile, and deduce conclusions as to the manifest superiority of the canine brain.
To me this beautiful little example of Divine construction may be a teacher of scientific truths, but it is also a great deal more than that. My memory clothes it with mobile muscles and skin, covered with fine, short hair, in patches of white and yellow. Where another sees only hollow sockets in which lurk perpetual shadows, I can see bright eyes wherein the sunshine played long ago, just as it plays in the topaz depths of some clear northern rivulet. I see the ears too, though the skull has none; and the ears listen and the eyes gaze with an infinite love and longing.
She was the friend of my boyhood . . .
Of course the reader cannot be expected to care very much about a poor little terrier that only loved its young master, as all dogs will, by reason of the instinct that is in them, and died more than eighteen years ago. I am willing to believe that millions of dogs have been as good as she was, and a great deal more valuable in the market, but no skull in the best natural history collections in Europe could tempt me to part with this. Every year makes the relic more precious, since every year certain recollections gradually fade, and this helps me to recover them. You may think that it is a questionable taste to keep so ghastly a reminder. It does not seem ghastly to me, but is only as the dried flower that we treasure in some sacred book. When I think by how much devoted affection this bony tenement was once inhabited, it seems to me still a most fair and beautiful dwelling.

* * *

-- Hamerton, Philip Gilbert, 1834-1894. Chapters On Animals. Boston: Roberts brothers, 1893. pp. 17-8.

gainsborough's dogs

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In the following anecdote, the painter Thomas Gainsborough (1727-88) and his wife Margaret use the family dogs as intermediaries when domestic quarrels arise.  I could wish Margaret's spaniel had spoken up less submissively, but (sigh) we are talking about 18th-century England.
***
GAINSBOROUGH AND HIS WIFE AND THEIR DOGS.

Thomas Gainsborough, the rival of Sir Joshua in portraiture, wanted that evenness of temper which the President of the Royal Academy so abundantly possessed. He was easily angered, but as soon appeased, and says his biographer, "If he was the first to offend, he was the first to atone. Whenever he spoke crossly to his wife, a remarkably sweet-tempered woman, he would write a note of repentance, sign it with the name of his favourite dog 'Fox' and address it to his Margaret's pet spaniel, 'Tristram.' Fox would take the note in his mouth, and duly deliver it to Tristram. Margaret would then answer 'My own dear Fox, you are always loving and good, and I am a naughty little female ever to worry you, as I too often do, so we will kiss and say no more about it; your own affectionate Tris.'" The writers of such a correspondence could not have led what is called "a cat and dog life." Husbands and wives might derive a hint from this anecdote; for we know, from the old ballad, that they will be sulky and quarrel at times even about getting "Up to bar the door!"

***

From a collection of animal anecdotes with a name I find pretty funny:

White, Adam, 1817-1879. Heads And Tales, Or, Anecdotes And Stories of Quadrupeds And Other Beasts Chiefly Connected With Incidents In the Histories of More Or Less Distinguished Men. London: J. Nisbet, 1870. pp. 100-101.

sam bough's beloved bulldog: beauty is only skin deep

Sam Bough (English, worked in Scotland; 1822-78) was a landscape artist with a certain rough charm if his biography is any indication.  Greatly fond of cats and dogs, one of his best-loved companions was a white one-eyed bulldog named "Madame Saachi."  Saachi was another one of those beings whose exterior belies their tender nature.  I've provided the longish excerpt below for the sheer color of the tale:
***
"Sacchi" was a small-sized, pure bred, white bull-bitch, with brown patch on one side of the head. It had a grand massive chest, and all the leading characteristics of its race, and was by far the most noted of all the artist's dogs. It was bred at Bilston, in Staffordshire, and had the misfortune to lose one of its eyes in a fight with a cat, when young. Bough told Thomas Fairbairn, the artist, that he bought "Sacchi" with a grand pedigree and had to pay handsomely for the bargain. . .

The gentlest and kindest of dogs, "Sacchi's" playful snort acted as a terror to timid people; while its deep growl was significant of danger even to the most courageous of those who came in daily contact with it. "Sacchi" was in the artist's possession for about ten years, and grew to be a dog of much knowledge and sagacity. If anyone chanced to be sitting in its master's chair on his return of an evening, "Sacchi" at once leaped up at the back of the chair, and kept edging round and working its nose in here, there, and everywhere in the most discomforting fashion, until the intruder was fairly ousted.
The dog, moreover, became very staid and regular in its habits; certainly much more so than its master could make any pretensions to be. If Bough happened to dine out, and was later than usual in returning home, it is said that "Sacchi" would scarcely deign to notice him on the following morning, and persistently refused to accompany him either to his studio or anywhere else for the time being. When under this spell, the utmost that much coaxing could extract from the dog was a listless wag or two of the tail, not the least effort to follow being discernible.
Soon after Bough had become the owner of "Sacchi," an intimate friend of his strolled into his studio. By way of introducing his new purchase to notice, the artist called out, "Sacchi, get up here—that's a good dog—and give the gentleman a kiss." Doing as it was bid, the dog leaped on the table, and fawningly lapped the cheek of Bough's friend with its tongue. Although dog and man became good friends from that day forward, the latter declared he never forgot the moment that the ungainly brute stood slobbering against his face, with its ugly mouth and dangerous looking teeth.
***
Upon Saachi's passing, the story continues, Bough donated her body to the Anatomical Museum in Edinburgh, where her skeleton was preserved as a fine example of the English bulldog.

Here's a link to Bough's self portrait with this loyal friend.

Gilpin, S. (1905). Sam Bough, R. S. A.: some account of his life and works. London: G. Bell. 163-5.

mortimer collins' editorial dog

thanks british library flickr (PD)

Mortimer Collins (English; 1827-76) sounds like a lost Dark Shadows character, but he was indeed a poet and novelist of a certain colorful renown.  A photo of Collins shows that he was what his wife later fondly recalled as "a splendid big fellow," and that does not seem to have been limited solely to his person.  Here's a comment found in a review of his biography:

That he was a Bohemian to the last is evident from the fact that at a literary dinner given by the Lord Mayor in 1876 he wore his velvet coat, a freedom which seems either to argue a sense of self-importance, or a lazy indifference to the common courtesies of society. A gentleman always shrinks from making himself conspicuous, and to appear at a great public banquet in a shooting-coat and white waistcoat was, to say the least, a proof of execrable taste. (1877, August 4) Mortimer Collins. The Spectator, pp. 20-21.

Doesn't he sound great?  As you can imagine, he earned a reputation for being bold, brusque, and impolite, yet at the same time loved little deer, kept a bunch of owls, and wrote quick love-poems to his wife before dinner.  The following is an excerpt from one of his books, in which he muses on the sudden passing of a problematic, beloved dog:

Oct. 8.
If my notes are dull and brief this day, kind-hearted readers will forgive me when I tell them that I have just put turf on the tomb of a favourite Skye terrier, who died suddenly on Wednesday. He was the most affectionate, irritable, excitable dog in the world; would bite my boot savagely if by accident, I touched him, and then put his cool black nose in my hand by way of apology. He was given me eight years ago by the editor of one of our Quarterlies, because in his jealous moods he would bite the legs of a newly-arrived editorial baby. It is a Liberal review, so I at once accepted Fido as a Tory dog. Tory he was, to the backbone. He loved his mistress and he hated cats. Can a good Constitutional dog's epitaph be written in fewer words? Well, he was skylarking in my bookroom with his heels in the air; and then he rushed out on the lawn in the sunshine; and then we heard a strange scream—and dear old Fido was picked up dead. I suppose it is humiliating to confess that I have shed some tears about him. If my aunt, Miss Angelina Vixen, had died and left me that quiet two thousand a year on which she now maintains missionaries and cats, I might not have wept much; but I did mourn my poor dear irrepressible troublesome Fi, who was wont to interrupt me in the midst of an attempted epigram. With my own hands have I buried my dear friend beneath the yellowing limes. Shall I meet his spirit again? Ah! who can solve that problem?

-- from Collins, M. (1880). Thoughts in my garden. London: Bentley. 14-16.

a theatrical watchdog

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English actor/manager Cyril Maude wrote a book of theater reminisces in 1928.  Here's what he recalls about working with Sir Charles Wyndham  - and his well-trained sidekick - in the play "Money."

. . . We rehearsed day after day for a month. Wyndham always brought a tiresome little dog to rehearsal. It kept running about all over the place and getting in people's way, and generally annoying everybody. One day (Sir Herbert) Tree, Irene Vanbrugh and I were standing watching the little dog and I said to them, "I suppose you know that little dog has been trained by Lady Wyndham to watch over Sir Charles, and in case he speaks longer to any particular lady than he ought to the little dog gets hold of him by the ankle just to remind him of Lady Wyndham!" They both laughed at the idea, and then Irene looked up sweetly in Sir Herbert's face and said, "And do tell me, Sir Herbert, has Lady Tree trained a little dog to watch over your goings on?" Tree gazed up at the ceiling of Drury Lane Theater and, stroking his locks, said, "Ah—it died from want of sleep!"

-- from Cyril Maude (1928) Lest I forget: being the reminiscences of social & dramatic life in England & America. New York: J. H. Sears & company, inc.. 228-9