The People Watched and Marvelled

The People Watched and Marvelled
by MURIEL MOREHOUSE of the Hoosier Dachshund Club
for the American Dachshund Magazine, October, 1964

My Lotze is a people-dog.  He allows me to say that I own him.  Being a Dachshund, he is naturally a gentleman and does not remind me too often that the matter of ownership is a debatable point; but I find myself doing just what he wants me to most of the time.
For example, I am a rather messy housekeeper, and he tactfully sees to it that things around the house are kept in order.  He has a special tone of voice to use when I leave something out of place or fail to do things in the proper order.
Unfortunately, I did not consult him when I purchased a female dog to share our home, and his patience with me was strained.  Here he was, without advance notice, faced with the problem of training a young girl-pup.  At first, for a few hours, he almost became human.  He displayed a small - very small - amount of petulance, but then his better dog-nature won out and he manfully took on the training.
There were all sorts of problems:  The teaching of the proper places for taking care of physical needs; instruction as to how far a new arrival could go in misbehavior before harsh tones entered into the people voices; the proper places to sleep (second best of course to his favorite places); and, most important of all, the establishment in this girl child's mind of the necessary respect for him as her lord and master.  In this training, no harshness was used - just an occasional low, gutteral sound to remind her when she was over-stepping her bounds.  After all was done, he retired to his own special place for a well-earned rest.  All this was accomplished with no sign of resentment at this intrusion into his heretofore private domain.
The people watched and marvelled, knowing they would not have done as well.  They also wondered whether people could learn from Dachshunds, who give their love unstintingly and with great dignity, and thus make this world a better place.

Unrelated vintage photo circa 1940; source unknown.