20 A DOG OF FLANDERS.

Patrasche came of a race which had
toiled hard and cruelly from sire to
son in Flanders many a century—
slaves of slaves, dogs of the people,
beasts of the shafts and the harness,
creatures that lived straining their
sinews in the gall of the cart, and
died breaking their hearts on the
flints of the streets.

Patrasche had been born of parents
who had labored hard all their days
over the sharp-set stones of the va-
rious cities and the long, shadowless,
weary roads of the two Flanders
and of Brabant. He had been born
to no other heritage than those of
pain and of toil. He had been fed on
curses and baptized with blows. Why
not? It was a Christian country, and