Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1870-06-21
"Yaller Dogs'--Mark Twain's History
Of the Founder Of the Family
and his Descendants.

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When Noah disembarked at Ararat
he had scarcely touched the piel
when he proceeded to rally his pas,
sengers. He had just checked the
last item in the list--a Mr.. and Mrs
Bedbug-when the cringing figure
of a quadruped came sneaking dowr
the gang-plank with his tail between
his legs. "Drat it, if there amt thai
yaller dog !" says Noah, aiming s
vicious kick with his brogan at the
brute. But, with a facility born Of
long and bitter experience, the brute
lodged the proiectile, and calculating
"ki-yi," which is Syriac for "declined
with thanks" or mot for Jo," he
disappeared, while Noah, who had
his sea-legs on, was unable to recover
his equilibrium, and sat down with
emphasis on the back OF bis head.
Noah arose, and in accordance with
the style prevalent among the patri,
archs, no proceeded TO soothe bic
affronted dignity by pronouncing q
variegated anathema upon the yaller
dog, which had enthusiastically
sneaked unobserved on board, in the
confusion of putting to sea, and cap
sized the captain at the first port
He cursed that dog in body, limb,
bark, hide, hair, tail, and wag, and
all his generations, relations, and
kindred, by consequently or affinity,
and his heirs and assigns. He cursed
him with endless hunger, with per-
petual fear, perennial laziness, with
hopeless mango, with incessant heas,
and with his tail between his legs
He closed his stock of maledictions
by sparkling display of pyrotech-
MICS, from the demoralizing effect of
which the yaller dog has never re-
covered.
With this curse sticking to him
like revenue stamp, the yaller dog
can't help being "cussed." He don't
try to help it. He follows Noah
programme with a sneaking fidelity.
He is an Ishmalite among dogs. lie
receives the most oppressive courte-
sizes in the form of brickbats, boots,
and hot water, which make his life
an animated target excursion. He
boards around like district school
teacher, and it is meal time with him
"a hours in the day. The rest of
the time he bankers after something
to eat. He is too omniverous for an
epicure. Cram him at Delmonicos 8,
and he would hunger for a dessert
from an Albany boarding house.
He can't be utilized. He is too
tired. AS swill-cart locomotive, a
hunter, or sentinel, he is an igno-
minious failure. The dog-churn was
strsgetic attempt to employ his
waste energies, and butter had too
much self-respect to "come" at his
persuasion. So the dog-churn was
dropped.
No sausage maker dare foreclose
his lien on the yaller dog, lest his
customers--no longer "soothed and
sustained by an unfaltering trust
transfer their patronage to some less
audacious dealer. The savages, who
admire baked dog, and who can even
attack tripe and explore the myster-
les of hash without dismay, acknowl-
edged the yaller dog TO be too much
for their gastric intrepidity.
He always manages to belong to
a ragged, tobacco-chowing, whisky
drinking master whose business is
swapping dogs and cvading tho dog
tax. The yaller dog is acquainted
with himself, and he enjoys the inti-
macy with edifying contempt. He
sinks along through life, on "a dag
onal dog-trot, as in doubt as to which
end of him is entitled to tho prece-
dence. He is always pervaded by q
hang-dog sense of guilt, and when
retributive tinwarc is fastened to his
tail, he "fiies from the wrath to come
with q Mortified celebrity which ought
to be very suggestive to two legged
sinners of a similar ordeal in store
for him.
The yaller dog is--woll, to speak
in italics, he is O Sloucb.
QUEER SCAREs.- Henry III, OF
France, though he had driven his
enemies before him at Jarnac, trem.
bled from head to foot at the sight of