"All were loved and all were regretted, but life is made up of
forgetting."

"The best thing which a man possesses is his dog."

When I saw a man driving into my yard after this, I would dart out of a
back door and flee to sweet communion with my cows.

On one such occasion I shouted back that I did not want a horse of any
variety, could not engage any fruit trees, did not want the place
photographed, and was just going out to spend the day. I was courteously
but firmly informed that my latest visitor had, singular to relate, no
horse to dispose of, but he "would like fourteen dollars for my dog tax
for the current year!" As he was also sheriff, constable, and justice
of the peace, I did not think it worth while to argue the question,
although I had no more thought of being called up to pay a dog tax than
a hen tax or cat tax. I trembled, lest I should be obliged to enumerate
my entire menagerie--cats, dogs, canaries, rabbits, pigs, ducks, geese,
hens, turkeys, pigeons, peacocks, cows, and horses.

Each kind deserves an entire chapter, and how easy it would be to write
of cats and their admirers from Cambyses to Warner; of dogs and their
friends from Ulysses to Bismarck. I agree with Ik Marvel that a cat is
like a politician, sly and diplomatic; purring--for food; and
affectionate--for a consideration; really caring nothing for friendship
and devotion, except as means to an end. Those who write books and
articles and verse and prose tributes to cats think very differently,
but the cats I have met have been of this type.