I think one cannot help attaching a great deal of importance to what this lady says, as her language is strictly moderate throughout, and because she does not seem to have been biassed by any special views on the subject of animal futurity.

Correspondent No. 2 (who, by the way, is a total stranger to the writer whose letter I have just quoted) is candidly devoted to dogs, regarding them as in every way on a par with, if not actually superior to, most human beings.  Still, notwithstanding this partiality, and consequent profusion of terms of endearment, which will doubtless prove somewhat nauseating to many, her letter is, in my opinion, valuable, because it not only refers to the phenomenon I have mentioned, but to a certain extent furnishes a reason for its occurrence.  The lady writes as follows:—­

“I once had a rough-haired dachshund, Robert, whom I loved devotedly.  We were living at the time near H——­ Street, which always had a peculiar attraction for dear Robert, who, I am now obliged to confess, had rather too much liberty—­more, indeed, than eventually proved good for him.  The servants complained that Robert ruled the house, and I believe what they said was true, for my sister and I idolized him, giving him the very best of everything and never having the heart to refuse him anything he wanted.  You will probably scarcely credit it, but I have sat up all night nursing him when he had a cold and was otherwise indisposed.  Can you therefore imagine my feelings when my darling was absent one day from dinner?  Such a thing had never happened before, for, fond of morning ‘constitutionals’ as poor Robert was, he was always the soul of punctuality at meal times.

“Neither my sister nor I would hear of eating anything.  Whilst he was missing, not a morsel did we touch, but slipping on our hats, and bidding the servants do the same, we scoured the neighbourhood instead.  The afternoon passed without any sign of Robert, and when bedtime came (he always slept in our room) and still no signs of our pet, I thought we should both have gone mad.  Of course, we advertised, selecting the most popular and, accordingly, the most likely papers, and we resorted to other mediums, too, but, alas! it was hopeless.  Our darling little Robert was irrevocably, irredeemably lost.  For days we were utterly inconsolable, doing nothing but mope morning, noon, and night.  I cannot tell you how forlorn we felt, nor how long we should have remained in that state but for an incident which, although revealing the terrible manner of his death, gave us every reason to feel sure we were not parted from him for all time, but would meet again in the great hereafter.  It happened in this wise:  I was walking along W——­ Street one evening when, to my intense joy and surprise, I suddenly saw my darling standing on the pavement a few feet ahead of me, regarding me intently from out of his pathetic brown eyes.  A sensation of extreme coldness now stole over me, and I noticed with something akin