Not that I mean to blame the Master, for when sober, which he
sometimes was, though not, as you might say, his habit, he was most
kind to me, and let me out to find food, if I could get it, and only
kicked me when I didn't pick him up at night and lead him home.
But kicks will stiffen the muscles, and starving a dog so as to get
him ugly-tempered for a fight may make him nasty, but it's weakening
to his insides, and it causes the legs to wabble.
The ring was in a hall, back of a public-house. There was a red-hot
whitewashed stove in one corner, and the ring in the other. I lay in
the Master's lap, wrapped in my blanket, and, spite of the stove,
shivering awful; but I always shiver before a fight; I can't help
gettin' excited. While the men-folks were a-flashing their money and
taking their last drink at the bar, a little Irish groom in gaiters
came up to me and give me the back of his hand to smell, and
scratched me behind the ears.
"You poor little pup," says he. "You haven't no show," he says. "That
brute in the tap-room, he'll eat your heart out."
"That's what you think," says the Master, snarling. "I'll lay you a
quid the Kid chews him up.
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