Wednesday, December 21, 2011

the pit bull in literature

Excerpt from Wuthering Heights written by Emily Bronte and published in 1847.

'Run, Heathcliff, run!' " she whispered; 'they have let the bulldog loose, and he holds me!'

The devil had seized her ankle, Nelly; I heard his abominable snorting. She did not yell out — no! She would have scorned to do it, if she had been spitted on the horns of a mad cow. I did, though; I vociferated curses enough to annihilate any fiend in Christiandom; and I got a stone and thrust it down his throat. A beast of a servant came up with a lantern, at last, shouting —

'Keep fast, Skulker, keep fast!'

He changed his note, however, when he saw Skulker's game. The dog was throttled off — his huge, purple tongue hanging half a foot out of his mouth, and his pendant lips streaming with bloody slaver.

The man took Cathy up — she was sick; not from fear, I'm certain, but from pain. He carried her in; I followed, grumbling execrations and vengeance.

'What prey, Robert?' hollooed Linton from the entrance.

'Skulker has caught a little girl, sir' he replied, 'and there's a lad here...'

the passage continues

'That's Miss Earnshaw!' he whispered to his mother, 'and look how Skulker has bitten her — how her foot bleeds!

'Miss Earnshaw? Nonsense!' cried the dame, 'Miss Earnshaw scouring the country with a gipsy! And yet, my dear, the child is in mourning — surely it is — and may be lamed for life.'


Wuthering Heights is available at project gutenberg and amazon.com. pick up a dog fighting book ar two while at amazon.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Decided to do some research on the America's dog claim and here's what I came up with.

1912 Kenmore Sorceress the wire fox terrier wins title of "best dog in America" at the Westmenster Kennel Club.

Also remember nutters like Fuzzy claiming that Shepards and other so called dangerous breeds were hated while the pit bull was praised? Turns out that in 1913 according to The Sun Newspaper, "intelligence of the German Shepard dog has aroused wide interest in breed in this country and europe." And the paper goes to further note that the breed is becoming highly popular as a police and protection dog due to its ease of trainability.

Another story from 1901 tells of a Saint Bernard who was considered a fine example of an American dog.

Out of all the hype that pit type dogs were commonly known as Amercia's dog there seems to be no evidence that shows a correlation between any keyword search of archived material showing this supposedly oh so known popular fact. The few mentions that it vaguely implies mind you aren't even to the American pit bull or the Staffordshire. But other breeds entirely!

If the evidence was so available; you would think that the pit bull community would provide irrevocable proof that's not open to interpretation. Is that so hard? In fact; I'm surprised that Fuzzy's not here breathing down your throat on this blog. But then again, maybe he's smart enough to know that he would sound stupid trying to defend his position here.