There was a time, years past, when we enjoyed the company of so many other ravine walkers with their dogs. They're all gone now. We're the only ones left, with our 19- and 12-year-old little dogs. The other dogs, gradually gone. Their owners no longer finding a reason to venture into the ravine for long, leisurely nature walks. And they're older too, perhaps less inclined to challenge their physical resources.

So we were pleasantly surprised to come across an old friend walking with one of his two thirty-year-old sons who had recently adopted a rescue dog, which just happened to be a Great Dane, a superb creature.

Sydney, he told us, was long gone. At sixteen he had more than lived his life span, a beloved canine companion. He explained that when they'd taken him to the groomer's for his usual tidying up, she had noted he was bleeding from his mouth.

Sydney was a fairly small dog, perhaps small-to-medium, a mixed spaniel-terrier, it seemed, off-white, with hair that tended to grow quite unruly. He had his quiet enthusiasms, and was an extremely good-tempered animal. His owners devoted to his care and a deep appreciation for his company.

A visit to the veterinarian revealed he had a malignant cancerous mass in his mouth. Soon afterward, he said, surgery was done to remove the mass. It gave him an additional three months of life, before they understood they could no longer hold him to life because he was suffering too greatly. And they were forced to make that final decision.

They won't, he told us, attempt to replace him. They're too old to start all over again. And truth to tell, for them Sydney was irreplaceable.