[Stickeen, etc.], [ca.1887], Image 15

25 He proved himself the most heroic dog I ever saw. A living soul, laid bare under deadly stress. Inquiring intelligence of eyes A fine enduring trotter never tiring & with whom I enjoyed the most telling fellowship Calmly set his face against the storm Displaying keen persistent critical thought firmly held through the tumult of his fears as he hushed himself by sheer mental strength & ran his eye critically along the narrow slippery rope-like bridge apprehending the danger at the ends as well as at the middle where it was lowest This bridge [proved] to me was the connecting link between man & beast. A flame of energy It is difficult to tell all I saw & learned in this glacial storm to people sitting in comfort. He could keep calm & fat in any wilderness without any masters bodys care # Could make his way through any wind like a salmon through swift water # 16 years have gone since we escaped crossed the icy valley of death, but I still see that blue gulf & its bridge & I see Stick his wild eye 26 His little feet, hear his cry of agony & nervous screams of joyful deliverance, see his mind working & feel the mystery under which we all live & die Bright & dark angel with quick flashes of summer & winter close together # When we came to Indian villages he hardly noticed other dogs, wholly unlike these kingly magisterial dogs that ever draw a company of dependents at their hells – rather he was a hermit. A wandering star beyond the influence of any of his kind. Excessively serious. Compact smooth almost featureless He was seemingly incapable of anything like steady mental effort or intelligent appreciation of anything requiring it. But he was now awake & lighted from within. A wise deep self-contained dog. He had a dull opaque face all but the eye in which he was rich # There is no lack of real moral sympathy with animals among children & savages, but civilization strange to say seems always to kill ithttps://scholarlycommons.pacific.edu/jmn-st1/1014/thumbnail.jp