Another and more remarkable instance of the effects of jealousy on a dog, I will take from that mine of good stories contained in Miss Serrell’s book.[8] Whankey, the hero of the story, was a black and tan wire-haired terrier, a dog of such beauty that she was pronounced to be faultless in make and shape. She was too of a singularly engaging and affectionate disposition. To her mistress her attachment was very great, and as Miss Serrell says, “She could never tolerate anything for which I showed affection.”
“At one time,” the narrator goes on, “I kept a large head of poultry which Whankey looked on with great disdain. She would never go near them, and her anger knew no bounds when once, being pressed for room, I had a trip of young game chicks brought up and cooped on the lawn.”
“All went well for a time, Whankey affecting to ignore their presence. One very precocious young cockerel, however, soon took to leaving the others and marching up the steps of the verandah in front of the drawing room windows. One day he ventured to come close and look into the room, when Whankey was instantly on the alert and growled angrily at the intrusion. Growing bolder as he came to know the verandah better, the cockerel at last walked through the window into the room where I was sitting at the time. Whankey showed such anger at his audacity that I was glad to throw the bird some crumbs and get him back on to the lawn, and as Whankey then quieted down no more was thought about the matter.
“The following day, when I returned from a drive, I found Whankey in her usual place in the drawing room with the window open, and noticing some earth on her nose and paws, I said to her, ‘What have you been burying, Whankey?’ On this, instead of greeting me, she got up and walked out of the room. In the evening when the chicks were penned in their coop there was a hue and cry; one was missing, and this turned out to be the little pert cockerel. A few days afterwards his body was found buried under the shrubs at the far end of the garden, and of course there were all sorts of conjectures as to the manner of his death. Some were of opinion that a stray cat had done it, but the mystery was not cleared up till many months later....