Dogs

'Has your little hairy absurdity arrived ? and what do you think of his rummest of mugs? and that tail! I hope you mean to keep it right, by putting it in a curlpaper every evening. He is the greatest oddity I have seen for many a day, As far as I can judge, he is a genuine Skye, with a third of his vertebras omitted, and all the marrow of the omission transferred to his tail, that hooked tail. Cultivate him, study him, sing his praises and his tail in a series of Sonnets.’ So wrote John Brown (Number 51) to his friend Andrew Coventry Dick, Sheriff Substitute of Bute, to whom he had sent the little dog. Although Brown (Number 51) was a busy doctor he always found time for writing and through his writing became a friend of many contemporary writers, including Ruskin, Thackeray and Mark Twain. His first writing was in response to a request for contributions about paintings exhibited by the Royal Scottish Academy. He published a number of books. Brown’s love of dogs came to good use in his story Rab and his Friends, his most popular book and one that was very successful. The story begins with a fight between Rab, ‘a ‘huge mastiff’ sheep dog, ‘old, grey, brindled, as big as a Highland bull’ and a terrier, and ends with the faithful sheep dog's funeral. (Sketches of dogs by Doctor John Brown )

In a letter written in February 1850, again to Dick, Brown announced: ‘We have an infant dog at present called Puck, and it is dreadful the distraction we are kept in between the deepest affection and disgust at the little devil.’ But a later letter had unhappy news: ‘In addition to our discomforts, we have lost our dog, Puck, a fellow of infinite humour and affection and the very doggest of dogs. We have proclaimed our sorrows in an emphatic Bill, in which the word PUCK plays a great part. But seriously it is no joke losing a dog. I hope yours is still yours, and that it is waxing funnier and unaccountabler and transcendentaller than ever. Our darling little hairy terrier who got kicked and killed by a clumsy horse the other day because he was too good for this world, will certainly get between St. Peter's legs as he lets me in. ... Meantime, keep happy, and let us both look for the happy hunting-ground where we shall meet all our dogs again.’

Many houses in the street must have owned dogs, and terriers seem to have been a favourite breed, for there are numerous newspaper adverts seeking missing dogs. ‘Stolen or strayed from 47 Albany Street on Saturday morning, a fawn coloured English Terrier pup, answers to the name of “Norad”. A handsome reward will be given for its return.’ and ‘LOST. Yesterday Afternoon, an English terrier, Black and Tan. two years old. Tail cut. but not ears. Had on when lost, leather collar, with brass plate, but no name. Whoever will bring it to No. 23 Albany Street will be suitably rewarded.’ It is not known if either of the pets were reunited with their Albany Street owners.

Nor is it known if the Reverend William Robertson (Number 29) was a dog owner. One hopes, however, that Robertson greeted or even ruffled the ears of the little terrier dog that he must have often seen in the graveyard of New Greyfriars Church where he was the Minister in the 1860s. The dog had belonged to John Gray, a night watchman with the Edinburgh Police Force, and the little terrier patrolled the city’s cobbled streets with his master every night. When Gray died from tuberculosis in February 1858 he was buried in Greyfriars Kirkyard. Within days people noticed that his faithful terrier lay every day next to his master’s grave and, in spite of persistent attempts to drive the dog away, kept returning. Perhaps it was Robertson, no doubt well aware of Proverbs 12.10 – A righteous man regards the life of his animal - who instructed the men in charge of the graveyard to create a shelter for the dog. As word spread of the little terrier’s fidelity for his dead master, groups would gather at the entrance of the Kirkyard waiting for the one o'clock gun that was the signal for the dog to leave the grave and follow William Dow, a local joiner and cabinet maker, to the same Coffee House that he had frequented with his now dead master, where he was given a meal. When in 1867 a new bye-law was passed that required all dogs to be licensed in the city or they would be destroyed, the Lord Provost, Sir William Chambers, arranged for the city to pay the dog’s licence fee and presented the terrier dog with a collar with a brass inscription ‘Greyfriars Bobby from the Lord Provost 1867 licensed’. For fourteen years the dead man's faithful terrier kept constant watch and guard over the grave until his own death in 1872. Baroness Angelia Georgina Burdett-Coutts, President of the Ladies Committee of the RSPCA, was so deeply moved by his story that she asked the City Council for permission to erect a granite fountain with a statue of Greyfriars Bobby placed on top. Bobby’s shiny nose, polished by many friendly pats, is evidence of his undying fame.

Mrs Carnegy Ritchie who lived at Number 10 self-published her own book of poems in 1861 and one is, 'Lines on the death of a favourite dog'.

Meek and affectionate thou wert,

Sagacious e'en beyond thy kind,

Thy very look went to my heart,

Displaying almost human kind.

Much didst thou love thy mistress dear,

Anxious with her aye to abide,

Ne'er happy but when she was near,

Blessed, e'en in pain, if by her side

Ah! she will often think of thee,

Her watchful, faithful, constant friend;

Yes! much she'll miss thy company,

While she her lonely way doth wend.