Part I Chapter 9 Doctor Dolittle's Garden by Hugh Lofting
CITY LIFE
"But my yearning to see the world led me to drop that too, just as it had the peace of the monastic life. And the day came when I said good-bye to the shepherd and his dog and set out once more. It had been kind of lonely on the sheep farm and I thought I would like to try city life for a while. I journeyed on till I came to a big town. You see, being still pretty inexperienced, I thought it would be quite a simple matter for a dog to go to a city and take up his residence there like a person. But I discovered it wasn't.
"Firstly, finding a place to live was hard. I solved that problem eventually by taking up my quarters in an old packing-case which I found in an empty lot. It was one of those places where people dump rubbish. The packing-case, as a kennel, left a good deal to be desired, but it might have been worse. The wind and the rain blew in through the holes of it. But it was much better after I had stuffed it and lined it with some straw and rags which I found near by among the rubbish.
"Another problem was the food. This was always sort of hard. But I had supposed it would be easier in a city where so many had to be fed and such a lot of food was on sale. But, on the contrary, I never met with such extraordinary difficulty in getting enough to eat.
"However the worst thing of all was the dog-catchers. In cities, I discovered, homeless dogs are not allowed. By homeless they mean ownerless. An office called The Department of Public Health is responsible for this. It is not supposed to be healthy for a town to have ownerless dogs knocking around its streets.
"Of all the inhospitable unfriendly institutions that of Town Dog-catchers is I think the worst. The idea is this: a man with a wagon goes round the streets. And any dogs he finds who haven't collars on, or who appear to be without masters, or lost, get grabbed by the dog-catcher and put into his wagon. Then they are taken to a place and kept there to see if anyone wishes to claim them or adopt them. After a certain number of days, if no one has come forward to give them a home, they are destroyed.
"Dear me, what a time I had keeping out of the clutches of those dog-catchers! I seemed to be always getting chased. Life just wasn't worth living. Although I managed to get away I finally decided that a town was no place for me and that I didn't care for city life at all.
"And then just as I was preparing to leave one evening I did get caught. Goodness, how scared I was! As the wretched old wagon rumbled along over the cobbled streets I cowered inside, thinking that the end of my career had surely come. At the home or whatever it was called where we were taken, we were treated quite kindly, as a matter of fact—fed well and given decent beds. Well, there I waited in the greatest anxiety wondering whether I was going to get adopted or not.
"On the third day, which I believe was the last day of grace allowed, an old lady called at the home. It seemed it was a habit of hers, calling to see if she could rescue any stray dogs from destruction. Her keen old eyes picked me out right away.
"'Oh,' said she, 'he looks a nice dog, that Aberdeen over there. I think I can find a home for him.'
"Then she asked the man in charge to keep me till the next day, when she hoped to be able to bring some one along who would adopt me.
"This she did. He was a funny sort of man, harmless enough. He took me away with a piece of string tied around my neck. And I assure you I was glad enough to go with him.
"After I got to his home I decided that he wasn't very anxious to have me, really, after all. I felt that most likely he had only taken me to oblige the old lady. He was one of those fussy bachelors, worse than any old maid—had to have everything in his house in apple-pie order and nearly had a fit if I got on to the chairs or left hairs on the hearth-rug.
"After staying with him a week I made up my mind that he would probably be greatly relieved if I ran away and freed him of my company. Which I did, choosing the night-time for my departure so that I could get out of the town without running into those wretched dog-catchers again."