Animals: Intentionally Witty

Wagner’s Kurwenal, a great, shaggy man, was Tristan’s tutor and companion. Mathilde, Baroness von Freytag-Loringhoven’s Kurwenal was a short, smooth-haired dachshund, probably the most remarkable dog of the Western world. Last week’s American Kennel Gazette gave the recently deceased dog Kurwenal a striking obituary.

He spoke by means of a number alphabet, one bark for a, two for b, three for c, as far as 16 for p; then backwards, ten for q, nine for r, to one for z. If there was doubt, Kurwenal was asked “Backwards?” or “Forward?” “Yes,” he would say with one bark; or “No,” with two. Among his intellectual feats:

¶ He described himself as “intentionally witty”; when his audience laughed, would wag his tail and yap, “I laugh heartily.”

¶ When his mistress and Herr Professor Max Müller of Munich one day discussed making dogs into sausages, Kurwenal exclaimed: “The Christian religion prohibits killing.”

¶ Once Animal Psychologist Otto Wulf, author of a book about Kurwenal, set him a problem: “On the street there are nine houses. I live in the fifth house, reckoning from the park. When coming toward the park, in which house do I live?” Kurwenal thought a moment, yapped: “Fifth.”

¶ Baroness von Freytag-Loringhoven’s good friend, Miss Emelie Augusta Louise Lind-af-Hageby, founder of the British Animal Defence and Anti-Vivisection Society, wrote she had moved into a new office. The Baroness asked Kurwenal what he said to that. He yelped: “No flowers. My warmest greetings.”

¶ To the wife of Jena’s Professor Ludwig H. Plate, he sighed, “I do love you so.” Frau Plate: “Oh! Don’t try to make me believe that.” Kurwenal: “I always speak the truth.”

¶ When a young Swiss neurologist from the University of Berne tried to trick him into making mistakes, he growled: “I answer no doubters. Bother the asses.”

Mathilde von Freytag-Loringhoven, who taught Kurwenal, is a motherly woman who looks something like Napoleon, with wisps of hair on her broad forehead, squinting eyes, a huge nose. She has trained many a dog, written many an article on the soul life of animals. Boldly she called scholars to “expose” her work, boasting that Kurwenal would perform when she was out of sight and earshot. Müller, Wulf, Plate and others went to her Weimar home to scoff, stayed to be yapped at.