Upon women, in crucial hours, may depend the peace of the old, the fortune of the middle-aged, the hopefulness of the young. In such an hour we do not wish to be dismissed as were the women of Socrates's family, who had had no part in the bright life of the Athens of which he was taking leave. Shall we become the bread in the sacrament of life, ourselves unfed? the fire on the hearth, ourselves unkindled?
If from almost any given point in the United States you start out towards the Southwest, you will reach in time the Land of the Sleepless Watchdog. On each of the scattered farms, defending it against all intruders, you will find a band of eager and vociferous dogs--dogs who magnify their calling because they have no other, and who, by the same token lose all sense of proportion in life. It is "theirs not to reason why," but to put up warnings and threats, and to be ready for the fight that never comes.
If you enter a domain without previous understanding with them, you are powerless for mischief, for you are in the center of a publicity beside which any other publicity is that of a hermit's cell. The whole farm knows where you are, and all are suspicious of your predatory intentions. You can have none under these conditions. Meanwhile the whole pack voices its opinion of you and your unworthiness.
This is supposing that you are actually there. If you are not, it amounts to the same thing. Every dog knows that you meant to be there, or at any rate, that to be there was the scheme of someone equally bad. The slightest rustle of the wind, the call of a bird, the ejaculation responsive to a flea--any of these, anything to set the pack going.
And one pack starts the next. And the cries of the two start the third and the fourth, and each of these reacts on the first. The cry passes along the line, "We have him at last, the mad invader." There being no other enemy, they cry out against each other. And of late years, since the barbed wire choked the cattle ranges, and gave pause to the coyote, there has been no enemy. But the dogs are there, though their function has passed away. It is but a tradition--a remembrance. Only to the dogs themselves does any reality exist.
Yet, such is the nature of dogs and men, the watchdog was never more numerous nor more alert than today. He was never in better voice, and having nothing whatever to do, he does it to the highest artistic perfection. At least one justification remains. Civilization has not done away with the moon. In the stillness of night, its great white face peeps over the hills at intervals no dog has yet determined. Under this weird light, strange shadowy forms trip across the fields. The watchdogs of each farm have given warning, and the whole countryside is eager with vociferation.