“I took him for a debt,” was the reply. “A Frenchman, who had trained this trick dog, owed me some money for fish and for boat hire. I had about given up all hope of ever getting my money, for the Frenchman said he was so poor he thought he could not pay for a long time. Then he asked me if I had children and if they loved animals. And when I said I had, and when I told him, Bunny and Sue, how fond you were of your dog Splash, when you had him, and how you liked your Shetland pony, Toby, the man asked me to take this trick dog in place of the money he owed me.”