The Birmingham age-herald., 1919-08-06
MEN, WOMEN
 AND THINGS

Mary's little lamb is known around the world, and there is no fear that it will perish fro mthe face of the earth so long as boys and girls are called upon to recite in school.
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 | But there is danger to the sheep indus try unless something is done to get rid of the sheep-killing dog. Now, I am a lover of dogs as you will know if you read my story of the death of "Wolly, the pet of my household. But this does not make me blind to the menace which threatens the raising of sheep in Ala bama.
 | confess right here and now in spite of what I shall write as to the need of passing stringent laws about letting worthless CUTS run at large, that never see the dog wagon with it's load of vari- gated pups picked up in it's perigrinations that I do not have the desire to overturn it or open the door and let them out or bunch by putting up the coin for the city 1 license.
 My emotions are mixed on the dog prop osition, for friend F. W. Dixon keeps after me to light into the sheep-killing dogs, and I see so much about the mad dog scare and the constant danger of rabies that the sight of homeless ca hines cause me much anguish of spirit 1 fo hat oi ar and run amuck to the harm of some man, woman or child.
 | I was coming in on the Mountain Ter race car the other day and was sitting opposite father and his little girl. He remarked that he was afraid that he would be late for his appointment with the doctor. I naturally expressed sympa- thy and asked if it was himself or child who was sick. He then told me it was his daughter, and that she had been bitten by a dog whose head was exam ined and symptoms of rabies were so plain that he was having her treated at the Pasteur institute l The mention of the word Pasteur set by memory to working, and I recalled how more than 30 years ago, when student in the Latin Quarter in Paris. the Pasteur institute was opened and how had gone to visit it, and had seen peo- pie from all parts of the world under ging treatment But the thing which got my goat was the sight of score of snapping and snarling dogs in all stages of madness which were being kept for experimental purposes by the great benefactor of mankind.
 I also recall that at the same time when Pasteur was at the height of his fame and his picture was one of the feat ures of the Salon, and his- institute the Mecca for scientists from everywhere that one of the noted members of the medical faculty was delivering lecturesFthat there was no such thing as hydrophobia I went to hear him, but having seen the pa tients and the dogs my eyes carried me with them and my brain refused to be- lieve that what I had seen was not true
 From that day to this have been afraid of dogs, and the sad part about it
 is they know it, for a canine is mighty canny and knows when he is feared, and therefore presumes on it.. The size of the dog, or the breed, has nothing to do with my fear. I am scared just because it is a dog, and I give them wide berth unless we have been properly introduced, and then I am bit suspicious that their intentions may not be honorable
 On the other hand I have friends who show no fear whatever of strange dogs, and think nothing of walking into a yard where a fierce dog is at liberty. When I am in the country and drive up to a home and a dog is sitting on the porch or peeping out from under the house, or even summing himself, it is my Llnvariable custom to hallo, and I never open the gate until I am duly chaperoned, for as I have said I am tirnid when it comes to meeting dogs
 It gets on nay nerves for fee to run out and bark at me, for d mad flee can infect you just as easy as a big, St. Bernard, for it isn't the size but the virus which gets in it's dirty work and pro- duces the dreaded disease of hydrophobia
 In my first pastorate I had just made a pastoral call and I was walking quietly land unooncerned towards the gate when a diminutve Spaniel slipped up behind me and nipped me in the calf of the left
 leg.
 It was in the days when I was in my prime, and having established record al
 one of the southern colleges for the high
 jump, I added an inch to it by clearing
 the fence and making run for my
 study, where I took a pair of shears and thrust them into the grate until they be-
 came red hot and cauterized the bite. wasn't going to take any chances. Ii
 may not have done any good but il
 composed my mind and made me fec safe. , I had friend, a railroad telegrapher who lost job after job on account oi
 drink, but who was such a good fellow , that they just passed him from one sta : ton to another, but finally he found him T 1 self out in New Mexico stranded, hay ing outworn the patience of the whole
 system. If l could put on paper the tale he told me I could get good money foi 5 it in any of the magazines of the day
 for it was lurid. picturesque and personal
 and had local color to burn.
 I IIa !,