meat-scraps that had been placed near his basket every morning.
Before the end of the winter he accompanied his friends to that same riding-school and was introduced to the veterinary surgeon of the regiment. Misknit bones had made his crooked legs a trifle crookeder, but he could run again and attest the vigor of his lungs by a lusty bark. A clear case of recovery in spite of—we did not venture to say because of—total abstinence from drugs.
"What did you feed him on?" inquired the surgeon, taking it for granted that Nature must have been assisted somehow or other.
"Nothing, for the first three weeks."
"What?"
"Nothing, sir. Or, to be quite exact, nothing except some air and water."
The surgeon shook his head. "Stout chaps, these daxes," he muttered, caressing the paradox with the tip of his boot. "The vitality of those brutes!" he probably thought to himself; "the idea of that thing recovering in spite of such neglect."
Surgeon K. had a horseload of instruments and might have succeeded in dosing the patient
