Читать книгу Man's Best Friends - True Stories of the World's Most Heroic Dogs - John McShane - Страница 5

George Graham Vest is far from being the most famous lawyer-politician in American history and Warrensburg, in Johnson County, Missouri, is the kind of small town that few ‘outsiders’ will have heard of. But it was in Warrensburg courthouse that Vest, a skilled orator, made a dramatic speech, which through emotional warmth and pinpoint accuracy was to enter the language. Its simplicity and truth summarised in a few short words a timeless relationship: that of a man or woman and their dog. A dog, said Vest, in words just as relevant today as when he first uttered them, is man’s best friend. Never has a truer word been spoken and never has the bond between the two been so accurately described.

He was addressing the jury in the case of a long-running dispute between two related neighbours centred on the death by shooting of Old Drum, a hunting dog belonging to one of them. On 23 September 1870 in what is now known as The Old Johnston County Courthouse, Vest – representing the dog’s owner – stood upright and summed up the case, eloquently praising the loyalty of a dog to his owner in terms that brought tears to the eyes of the jury (and all those who have since read his brief submission).

Under the heading ‘Eulogy of the Dog’, the official records of the American Senate note his remarks to the jury that day:

The best friend a man has in this world may turn against him and become his enemy. His son or daughter that he has reared with loving care may prove ungrateful. Those who are nearest and dearest to us, those whom we trust with our happiness and our good name may become traitors to their faith. The money that a man has, he may lose. It flies away from him, perhaps when he needs it the most. A man’s reputation may be sacrificed in a moment of ill-considered action. The people who are prone to fall on their knees to do us honour when success is with us may be the first to throw the stone of malice when failure settles its cloud upon our heads. The one absolutely unselfish friend that a man can have in this selfish world, the one that never deserts him and the one that never proves ungrateful or treacherous is his dog.

A man’s dog stands by him in prosperity and in poverty, in health and in sickness. He will sleep on the cold ground, where the wintry winds blow and the snow drives fiercely, if only he may be near his master’s side. He will kiss the hand that has no food to offer, he will lick the wounds and sores that come in encounters with the roughness of the world. He guards the sleep of his pauper master as if he were a prince. When all other friends desert, he remains. When riches take wings and reputation falls to pieces, he is as constant in his love as the sun in its journey through the heavens.

If fortune drives the master forth an outcast in the world, friendless and homeless, the faithful dog asks no higher privilege than that of accompanying him to guard against danger, to fight against his enemies, and when the last scene of all comes, and death takes the master in its embrace and his body is laid away in the cold ground, no matter if all other friends pursue their way, there by his graveside will the noble dog be found, his head between his paws, his eyes sad but open in alert watchfulness, faithful and true even to death.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Vest went on to win the case. Afterwards his speech took on a life of its own, being reprinted both in America and abroad, no doubt not only due to the eloquence of the language but also the simple, universal truth about the relationship between a man or woman and a dog at the core of his words. It is intriguing to note although the exact wording ‘a dog is a man’s best friend’ is never actually used and the friendship between the two had of course been noted before, Vest’s oration is now commonly accepted as the origin of the phrase.

This book chronicles the actions of a tiny number of those ‘best friends’. The dogs come in all shapes and sizes: some giant, some so small they could literally be put in a pocket. Some of the dogs have impeccable pedigrees. Others… well, let’s just say their lineage has become lost in time and who cares anyway? But all have one thing in common: their brave actions and speed of mind and body were invaluable, often life-saving, to those who cared for them and in return received devotion beyond the concept of most humans. Truly, they are the world’s most heroic dogs.