Long Long Ago When I Was a Flintman

Long long ago when I was a flintman, or a flintman's son, dogs had been treated as dogs. Dogs had kept vigil at the corner of a rear garden through the night, tied by a rope to a plum tree by the fence. There had not been special dog foods then. They had consumed human wastes who had been consumed by their masters usually during hot dog days.


Their fortune has made a sea change. Almost all the canine species have made entries to the indoors of houses or apartments, and a lot of them, especially those living in big city dwellings, find themselves nestled in woolly bedspreads or rugs. They eat on special canine foods and are clinically treated from time to time.


Mutts and their brethren who take leisurely afternoon strolls constitute major metropolitan landscapes. Young ladies and career women carry doggies in their arms whose babies might have taken their places only if they had gone to the altar. It might be too much of good dogs, up from savagery to civilization!