I suppose I
made senile noises when I dressed and undressed, expressive of my
decorative labors. This may have been the reason; possibly not;
but at any rate about this time he conceived it his duty to give up
his friendship as an equal and to enter my employ as a servant. He
became my valet--without wages--and I changed his name to 'Brown.'
"Of course you don't think this true; well, then, don't think it
true. But you have never seen him of winter mornings get up before
I do and try to keep me out of the bath-tub. He'll station himself
at the bath-room door; and as I approach he will look at me with an
air of saying; 'Now don't climb into that cold water! Stand on the
edge of it and lap it if you wish! But don't get into it. Drink
it, man, don't wallow in it.' He waits until I finish, and then he
speaks his mind plainly again: 'Now see how wet you are! And
to-morrow you will do the same thing.' And he will stalk away,
suspicious of the grade of my intelligence.
"He helps me to dress and undress. You'd know this if you studied
his face when I struggle to brush the dust off of my back and
shoulders: the mortification, the sense of injustice done him, in
his having been made a quadruped. When I stoop over to take off my
shoes, if I do it without any noise and he lies anywhere near, very
well; but if I am noisy about it, he always comes and takes a seat
before me and assists. Then he makes his same speech: 'What a
shame that you should have to do this for yourself, when I am here
to do it for you, but have no hands.
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