A Hundred Anecdotes of Animals
but sit there the whole day in sight of the dog. At length orders were given that she should no longer be molested; being thus left to herself, she ran about the yard with him all night, and what is particularly remarkable, whenever the dog went out of the yard and ran into the village, the goose always accompanied him, contriving to keep up with him by the assistance of her wings, and in this way of running and flying, followed him all over the parish. This extraordinary affection of the goose towards the dog, which continued till his death, two years after it was first observed, is supposed to have originated in his having saved her from a fox, in the very moment of distress.

    While the dog was ill, the goose never quitted him, day or night, not even to feed; and it was apprehended that she would have been starved to death had not a pan of corn been set every day close to the kennel. At this time the goose generally sat in the kennel, and would not suffer any one to approach it, except the person who brought the dog’s, or her own food. The end of this faithful bird was melancholy; for when the dog died, she would still keep possession of the kennel, and a new house dog being introduced, which in size and colour resembled that lately lost, the poor goose was unhappily deceived, and going into the kennel as usual, the new inhabitant seized her by the throat and killed her.

    After the execution of Sabinus, the Roman general, who suffered death for his attachment to the family of Germanicus, his body was exposed to the public upon the precipice of the Gemoniæ, as a warning to all who should dare to befriend the house of Germanicus: no friend had courage to approach the body; one only remained true—his faithful dog. For three days the animal continued to watch the body; his pathetic howlings awakened the sympathy of every heart. Food was brought him, which he was kindly encouraged to eat; but on taking the bread, instead of obeying the impulse of hunger, he fondly laid it on his master’s mouth, and renewed his lamentations; days thus passed, nor did he for a moment quit the body.

    The body was at length thrown into the Tiber, and the generous creature, still unwilling that it should perish, leaped into the water after it, and clasping the corpse between its paws, vainly endeavoured to preserve it from sinking.

    A wren built her nest in a box, so situated that a family had an opportunity of observing the mother bird instructing the young ones in the art of singing peculiar to the species. She fixed herself on one side of the opening in the box, directly before her young, and began by 
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