"This is all I can find about dogs," explained the boy, passing
the linen-jacketed little volume across the counter to Link.
"First story in it is an essay on 'Our Friend, the Dog,' the
index says. Want it?"

That evening, by his kitchen lamp, Ferris read laboriously the
Belgian philosopher's dog essay. He read it aloud--as he had
taken to thinking aloud--for Chum's benefit. And there were many
parts of the immortal essay from which the man gleaned no more
sense than did the collie.

It began with a promising account of a puppy named Pelleas. But
midway it branched off into something else. Something Link could
not make head nor tail of. Then, on second reading, bits of
Maeterlinck's meaning, here and there, seeped into Ferris's
bewilderedly groping intellect.

He learned, among other things, that Man is all alone on earth;
that most animals don't know he is here, and that the rest of
them have no use for him. That even flowers and crops will desert
him and run again to wildness, if Man turns his back on them for
a minute. So will his horse, his cow and his sheep. They graft on
him for a living, and they hate or ignore him.

The dog alone, Link spelled out, has pierced the vast barrier
between humans and other beasts, and has ranged himself,
willingly and joyously, on the side of Man. For Man's sake the
dog will not only starve and suffer and lay down his life, but
will betray his fellow quadrupeds. Man is the dog's god. And the