[ Merrill / Stories about Dogs ]
Rufus Merrill (1803 - 1891) was an American writer of young adult literature who published a large number of works, many of them collections of stories or songs, for young readers during the 1840s and 1850s. This particular work seems to have been self-published in Concord, New Hampshire, in 1850, which may explain why it does not show up in a WorldCat search for "Rufus Merrill," though he has 90 entries in that online database of library holdings. There were 8 illustrations in this volume but none of Newfoundlands.
The title page of this pamphlet-length work reads "Part III. Stories about Dogs."
Here's what Merrill has to say about Newfoundlands, found in the book's closing, catch-all chapter entitled "Anecdotes of Dogs."
We have heard a very curious anecdote of a Newfoundland dog, who had a mastiff for a neighbor. These dogs were good natured when alone, but were in the habit of fighting when they met. One day they had a fierce and prolonged battle on a bridge, from which they both fell into the sea; and they had no means of escape but by swimming a considerable distance. Each began, therefore, to make for the land as best he could.
The Newfoundland, being an excellent swimmer, very speedily gained the land, on which he stood shaking himself, at the same time watching the motions of his tall antagonist, who, being no swimmer, was struggling in the water a just about to sink. In dashed the Newfoundland, took the other gently by the collar, kept his head above water, and brought him safely on shore.
A child, once playing on a wharf with a Newfoundland dog belonging to his father, accidentally fell into the water. The dog immediately sprang after the child, who was only six years old, and, seizing the waist of his little frock, brought him into the dock, where there was a staging, by which the child held on, but was unable to get to the top. The dog, seeing it was unable to pull the little fellow out of the water, ran up to a yard adjoining, where a girl of nine years old was hanging out clothes. He seized her by the gown, and, not withstanding her efforts to get away, he succeeded in dragging her to the spot where the child was still hanging by its hands to the staging. On the girl's taking hold of the child, the dog assisted her in rescuing the little fellow from his perilous situation, and, after licking the face of the infant he had saved, it took a leap off the stage, and swam round the head of the wharf, to get the hat, which had fallen off the child's head. (11-15)