Only For the Dog lover

[gone fishin]

Originally Posted by ProfessorM

If you have been there you will understand



“ … For if the dog be well remembered, if sometimes she leaps through your dreams actual as in life, eyes kindling, laughing, begging, it matters not where that dog sleeps. On a hill where the wind is unrebuked and the trees are roaring, or beside a stream she knew in puppyhood, or somewhere in the flatness of a pastureland. It is one to a dog, and all one to you, and nothing is gained and nothing is lost – if memory lives. But there is one best place to bury a dog.
“ If you bury her in this spot, she will come to you when you call – come to you over the grim, dim frontiers of death, and down the well-remembered path and to your side again. And though you may call a dozen living dogs to heal. They shall not growl at her nor resent her coming, for she belongs there.
“People may scoff at you, who see no lightest blade of grass bent by her footfall, who hear no whimper, people who have never really had a dog. Smile at them, for you shall know something that is hidden from them
“The one best place to bury a good dog is in the heart of her master.”

Anonymous

Well put Paul... I have had the privilage of 7 dogs in my lifetime. Each has left a memory and each was different. I still miss each and every one. Sorry to hear of your loss.

[Duke41]

Epitaph To a Dog

Near this spot
Are deposited the Remains Of one
who possessed Beauty without Vanity,
Strength without Insolence,
Courage without Ferocity,
and all the virtues of Man without his Vices.
This praise, which would be unmeaning Flattery
if inscribed over human Ashes
Is but a just tribute to the Memory of
BOATSWAIN, A DOG.
Who was born at Newfoundland May 1803
And died in Newstead Nov. 18th 1808.

When some proud son of man returns to Earth,
Unknown by Glory, but upheld by Birth,
The sculptor’s art exhausts the pomp of woe,
And stories urns record that rests below.
When all is done, upon the Tomb is seen,
Not what he was, but what he should have been.
But the poor Dog, in life the firmest friend,
The first to welcome, foremost to defend,
Whose honest heart is still his Master’s own,
Who labors, fights, lives, breathes for him alone,
Unhonour'd falls, unnoticed all his worth,
Deny'd in heaven the Soul he held on earth –
While man, vain insect! hopes to be forgiven,
And claims himself a sole exclusive heaven.
Oh man! thou feeble tenant of an hour,
Debased by slavery, or corrupt by power,
Who knows thee well must quit thee with disgust,
Degraded mass of animated dust!
Thy love is lust, thy friendship all a cheat,
Thy tongue hypocrisy, thy heart deceit.
By nature vile, ennoble but by name,
Each kindred brute might bid thee blush for shame.
Ye! who behold perchance this simple urn,
Pass on, it honors none you wish to mourn.
To mark a friend’s remains these stones arise;
I never knew but one – and here he lies.

- Lord Byron’s tribute to “Boatswain,” on a monument in the garden of Newstead Abbey.