There she lay, a little, gaunt, scarred creature, starved and worried
to death by him. Her mouth was half open, her eyes were staring.
She would never again look kindly at me, or curl up to me at night
to keep me warm. Oh, how I hated her murderer! But I sat quietly,
even when he went up and turned her over with his foot to see if
she was really dead. I think he was a little sorry, for he turned
scornfully toward me and said, "She was worth two of you; why
didn't you go instead?"

Still I kept quiet till he walked up to me and kicked at me. My
heart was nearly broken, and I could stand no more. I flew at him
and gave him a savage bite on the ankle.

"Oho," he said, "so you are going to be a fighter, are you? I'll fix
you for that." His face was red and furious. He seized me by the
back of the neck and carried me out to the yard where a log lay on
the ground. "Bill," he called to one of his children, "bring me the
hatchet."

He laid my head on the log and pressed one hand on my struggling
body. I was now a year old and a full-sized dog. There was a quick,
dreadful pain, and he had cut off my ear, not in the way they cut
puppies' ears, but close to my head, so close that he cut off some of
the skin beyond it. Then he cut off the other ear, and, turning me
swiftly round, cut off my tail close to my body

Then he let me go and stood looking at me as I rolled on the
ground and yelped in agony. He was in such a passion that he did
not think that people passing by on the road might hear me.