Don, a Runaway Dog: His Many Adventures — Themes and Context

his trick of marching around like a soldier dog, with the broom for a gun _Frontispiece_

“He’s a fine dog!” cried Bob, as he patted and rubbed Don 23

He turned quickly to shake his head and horns at Don 39

Other dogs, coming to the fountain to get a drink, wanted to take Don’s bone away from him 65

“Get out of there, dog!” cried the policeman 81

He was all tangled up in the meshes of the net, and he fell down 99

“It’s my dog, Don, that ran away from the farm a long while ago!” 117

Don was one of five little puppies. With his brothers and sisters he cuddled up close to Mrs. Gurr, the mother dog, to keep warm, for it was rather cool for little dogs, even though there was plenty of straw in the kennel, or house, where they lived. Don shivered and trembled, but when his mother put her soft, warm paw over him and the other little dogs, Don felt better.

Don was such a little puppy that, as yet, his eyes were not open. I suppose they were made to stay closed until he grew to be a little stronger, for the sunlight was very bright outside of the kennel, and Don might have squinted, had his eyes been open.

But then Don and his brothers and sisters did not need to see much when they were so little.

“I can tell you everything that happens,” said Mrs. Gurr, the mamma dog. “You little puppies just stay close together when I go out to get a bone, or something else to eat, and you will keep warm, and nothing will happen to you.

“Humm! Humm! Humm!” whined Don. He really was the largest and strongest of the litter of puppies, and perhaps that is why he seemed to come first.

“What’s that you’re saying?” asked his mother. For you know, doggies have a language of their own. They cannot speak as we do, but they can understand when we speak to them. Dogs are smarter in some ways than we are. They can understand, and know, what we say to them, but _we_ can only guess at what they say, when they bark, growl or whine.

“What’s that you say?” asked Mrs. Gurr, of Don.

“Humm! Umph! Wee-wee!” went Don.

“Oh, you’re cold, are you?” asked Mrs. Gurr, who had this name because she sometimes made a noise that sounded that way――“gurr”――away down in her throat.

“Yes, I’m cold,” said Don, shivering.

“Well, cuddle up close to me, and you’ll soon be warm,” said the mamma dog. So Don, and his brothers Spot and Prince, and his sisters Violet and Ruby, crept still closer to their mother, for she was a big dog, and her hair was very warm.

For over a week Don and the other little dogs could see nothing, because their eyes were not open. They could hear strange noises going on outside their kennel, but they did not know what they meant.

Don especially, had many adventures, and a great many strange things happened to him. In this book I am going to tell you all about them, how he ran away, and was locked in a freight car, and how a bad boy tied a tin can to his tail――but there――I am getting ahead of my story. Those things did not happen until Don grew to be big. So I shall have to start at the beginning.

And the beginning was when Don still did not have his eyes open.

Whining, barking just a little, and tumbling about like little balls of cotton yarn, Don and the other puppies stayed in the straw in the kennel with their mother. Sometimes she went out to get something to eat, and then the little dogs crept closer to each other to keep warm. They slept a great deal of the time, for dogs, like babies, grow when they sleep.

Once, just before Don had his eyes open, he heard strange noises outside of the kennel house where he lived. Don did not know what the noises meant, but I shall tell you what they were. They were the voices of some boys talking.

“Oh, look at the puppies!” exclaimed one boy.

“What a lot of them,” said another.

“Yes, and they’re all mine,” spoke a third boy.

“Oh, Willie! Can’t I have one?” asked the first boy, and he reached down in the straw, and picked up Don. Mrs. Gurr, the mamma dog, growled a little and whined, for she did not like strange boys to handle her little puppies.

“You can’t have that one, Charlie,” answered the boy who had been called Willie.