'Tis the season to be spiffy i: Whit and the birds guy

An affable little beast, my English Cocker is impecuniously incautious in his zealotry for the presentable guest. I haven't any idea how he acquired this snooty conception of entitle-ment, unless by sheer deprivation by oneself. Can't be helped, I suppose, but we will not entertain pessimism toward new tricks; and it is somewhat heartening that his sartorialism is more one of nature than of anything passing for fashion. But this is true only up to a point, as all things are with a gentleman of parts.

Whit is emphatic in his wel-come of the fellow he refers to as, the birds guy. As awk-ward as we all can sometimes be with names, 'Johannes Niermann' is a great deal to draw down, from memory cells not vastly larger than Mr Perry's. But he does know what he values in attire, and the birds guy definitively has it, for Whit. One knows better than to go too far, toward unveiling another gentleman's core principles, and I've forborne from infringing on Whit's sovereignty in the matter. Innately birdy, anyway, Whit could be expected to favour the occasional panache of the woodcock, his ostensibly destined prey. But the water birds of Mr Niermann's habit quite escape our expectation.

Whit's markings are those of the blue roan, and he is himself, famous for his featherings. Yes, and you may feel free to remark on them, you know. But who could think of Whit, drawing any literalist affinity for markings from the rich grab bag of presentments to which, it is only fair to say, the household is exposed in any given month?

Readers will remember their reunions with Mr Niermann here, in their own ways. He has always been an articulate member of the company; and quite possibly Whit's gratitude for his clarity of utterance goes far toward defining the dog's sense of his spiffiness.

Found, out and about even more often than here, Niermann accounts for no small part in Whit's own superb conditioning, which the little beast has not been unknown to flaunt to obtain the upper hand in some of our conversations. There are certain trees on this property, and hedgerows and ponds, indeed, which constitute almost a checklist of gathering places where Whit will not fail to fly, in search of his birds guy. His diligence has cured me entirely of the assumption that these destinations represent a form of habit in his constitutionals, as he leaves no small statement of his frustration wherever Mr Niermann fails to turn up. He is plainly looking for his birds guy, and has made it a prerogative one has to accept.

  Why would a man put

  "Kenzo" on his waist,

  Auguste?

  So that he could find

  himself in a parking

  lot, I should think,

  Hercule.

    

ii-v  Johannes Niermann