Abramko, porter of the
silent, grim, deserted mansion, divided his office and his lodge with
three remarkably ferocious animals--an English bull-dog, a
Newfoundland dog, and another of the Pyrenean breed.
Behold the profound observations of human nature upon which Elie Magus
based his feeling of security, for secure he felt; he left home
without misgivings, slept with both ears shut, and feared no attempt
upon his daughter (his chief treasure), his pictures, or his money. In
the first place, Abramko's salary was increased every year by two
hundred francs so long as his master should live; and Magus, moreover,
was training Abramko as a money-lender in a small way. Abramko never
admitted anybody until he had surveyed them through a formidable
grated opening. He was a Hercules for strength, he worshiped Elie
Magus, as Sancho Panza worshiped Don Quixote. All day long the dogs
were shut up without food; at nightfall Abramko let them loose; and by
a cunning device the old Jew kept each animal at his post in the
courtyard or the garden by hanging a piece of meat just out of reach
on the top of a pole. The animals guarded the house, and sheer hunger
guarded the dogs. No odor that reached their nostrils could tempt them
from the neighborhood of that piece of meat; they would not have left
their places at the foot of the poles for the most engaging female of
the canine species. If a stranger by any chance intruded, the dogs
suspected him of ulterior designs upon their rations, which were only
taken down in the morning by Abramko himself when he awoke.
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