“That night we slept at a country hotel, and drove the next morning to the banks of a small lake where the young men were told there would be plenty of wild ducks.  They were in no hurry to begin their sport.  They sat down in the sun on some flat rocks at the water’s edge, and said they would have something to drink before setting to work.  They got out some of the bottles from the wagon, and began to take long drinks from them.  Then they got quarrelsome and mischievous, and seemed to forget all about their shooting.

“One of them proposed to have some fun with the dogs.  They tied us both to a tree, and throwing a stick in the water, told us to get it.  Of course we struggled and tried to get free, and chafed our necks with the rope.

“After a time one of them began to swear at me, and say that he believed I was gun-shy.  He staggered to the wagon and got out his fowling piece, and said he was going to try me.

“He loaded it, went to a little distance, and was going to fire, when the young man who owned Bob said he wasn’t going to have his dog’s legs shot off, and coming up he unfastened him and took him away.  You can imagine my feelings, as I stood there tied to the tree, with that stranger pointing his gun directly at me.  He fired close to me a number of times—­over my head and under my body.  The earth was cut up all around me.  I was terribly frightened, and howled and begged to be freed.

“The other young men, who were sitting laughing at me, thought it such good fun that they got their guns, too.  I never wish to spend such a terrible hour again.  I was sure they would kill me.  I dare say they would have done so, for they were all quite drunk by this time, if something had not happened.

“Poor Bob, who was almost as frightened as I was, and who lay shivering under the wagon, was killed by a shot by his own master, whose hand was the most unsteady of all.  He gave one loud howl, kicked convulsively, then turned over on his side and lay quite still.  It sobered them all.  They ran up to him, but he was quite dead.  They sat for a while quite silent, then they threw the rest of the bottles into the lake, dug a shallow grave for Bob, and putting me in the wagon drove slowly back to town.  They were not bad young men.  I don’t think they meant to hurt me, or to kill Bob.  It was the nasty stuff in the bottles that took away their reason.

“I was never the same dog again.  I was quite deaf in my right ear, and though I strove against it, I was so terribly afraid of even the sight of a gun that I would run and hide myself whenever one was shown to me.  My master was very angry with those young men, and it seemed as if he could not bear the sight of me.  One day he took me very kindly and brought me here, and asked Mr. Morris if he did not want a good-natured dog to play with the children.

“I have a happy home here and I love the Morris boys; but I often wish that I could keep from putting my tail between my legs and running home every time I hear the sound of a gun.”