This dog-lover's book was published in 1913 and tells the story of a French bull-dog named Pelleas.
A 4-Star Review:
Reviewer: Rietto - - September 10, 2009
Subject: Lovely bulldog illustrations
A short book with some very nice paintings of bulldogs
.............................................................................
An excerpt from the book:
I have lost, withing these last few days, a little bull-dog. He
had just completed the sixth month of his brief existence. He
had no history. His intelligent eyes opened to look out upon
the world, to love mankind, then closed again on the cruel
secrets of death.
The friend who presented me with him had given him, perhaps
by antiphrasis, the somewhat unexpected name of Pelleas.
Why re-christen him? For how can a poor dog, loving, devoted,
faithful, disgrace the name of a man or an imaginary hero?
Pelleas had a great, bulging, powerful forehead, like that of
Socrates or Verlaine; and, under a little black nose, blunt as a
churlish assent, a pair of large, hanging and symmetrical chops,
which made his head a sort of massive, obstinate, pensive and
three-cornered menace. He was beautiful after the manner of
a beautiful natural monster that has complied strictly with the
laws of its species. And what a smile of attentive obligingness,
of incorruptible innocence, of affectionate submission, of bound-
less gratitude and total self-abondonment lit up, at the least
caress, that adorable mask of ugliness! Whence exactly did
that smile emanate? From the ingenuous and melting eyes?
From the ears pricked up to catch the words of man? From
the forehead that un-wrinkled to appreciate and love, from
the four tiny, white, projecting teeth that shone with gladness
against the dark lips, or from the stump of a tail that, with its
abrupt bend, the mark of his race, wriggled at the other end to
testify to the intimate and impassioned joy that filled his small
being, happy once more to encounter the hand or the glance
of the god to whom he surrendered himself?
A 4-Star Review:
Reviewer: Rietto - - September 10, 2009
Subject: Lovely bulldog illustrations
A short book with some very nice paintings of bulldogs
.............................................................................
An excerpt from the book:
I have lost, withing these last few days, a little bull-dog. He
had just completed the sixth month of his brief existence. He
had no history. His intelligent eyes opened to look out upon
the world, to love mankind, then closed again on the cruel
secrets of death.
The friend who presented me with him had given him, perhaps
by antiphrasis, the somewhat unexpected name of Pelleas.
Why re-christen him? For how can a poor dog, loving, devoted,
faithful, disgrace the name of a man or an imaginary hero?
Pelleas had a great, bulging, powerful forehead, like that of
Socrates or Verlaine; and, under a little black nose, blunt as a
churlish assent, a pair of large, hanging and symmetrical chops,
which made his head a sort of massive, obstinate, pensive and
three-cornered menace. He was beautiful after the manner of
a beautiful natural monster that has complied strictly with the
laws of its species. And what a smile of attentive obligingness,
of incorruptible innocence, of affectionate submission, of bound-
less gratitude and total self-abondonment lit up, at the least
caress, that adorable mask of ugliness! Whence exactly did
that smile emanate? From the ingenuous and melting eyes?
From the ears pricked up to catch the words of man? From
the forehead that un-wrinkled to appreciate and love, from
the four tiny, white, projecting teeth that shone with gladness
against the dark lips, or from the stump of a tail that, with its
abrupt bend, the mark of his race, wriggled at the other end to
testify to the intimate and impassioned joy that filled his small
being, happy once more to encounter the hand or the glance
of the god to whom he surrendered himself?
