The Friday 56This is a weekly bloghop hosted by Freda’s Voice.

RULES:
The Friday 56 Grab a book, any book.
The Friday 56 Turn to Page 56 or 56% on your ereader. If you have to improvise, that is okay.
The Friday 56 Find a snippet, short and sweet.
The Friday 56 Post it.

The rules say I can improvise, and I almost never do. But I have to this time–I had a snippet of another book picked out, and I was okay with it, but I wasn’t completely sold. Then yesterday I came across this and just had to repeat it.
from Page 57 of:
E.B. White on Dogs

E.B. White on Dogs edited by Martha White

I would like to hand down a dissenting opinion in the case of the Camel ad that shows a Boston terrier relaxing. I can string along with cigarette manufacturers to a certain degree, but when it comes to the temperament and habits of terriers, I shall stand my ground.

The ad says: “A dog’s nervous system resembles our own.” I don’t think a dog’s nervous system resembles my own in the least. A dog’s nervous system is in a class by itself. If it resembles anything at all, it resembles the Consolidated Edison Company’s power plant. This is particularly true of Boston terriers, and if the Camel people don’t know that, they have never been around dogs.

The ad says: “But when a dog’s nerves tire, he obeys his instincts—he relaxes.” This, I admit, is true. But I should like to call attention to the fact that it sometimes takes days, even weeks, before a dog’s nerves tire. In the case of terriers it can run into months. I knew a Boston terrier once (he is now dead and, so far as I know, relaxed) whose nerves stayed keyed up from the twenty-fifth of one June to the sixth of the following July, without one minute’s peace for anybody in the family. He was an old dog and he was blind in one eye, but his infirmities caused no diminution in his nervous power.