This incident can be found in Chapter Fourteen of this
great novel, and is actually narrated to Nelly Dean by Heathcliff when he describes how
Isabella foolishly decided to elope with him. Heathcliff spends some time how he finally
managed to make his wife realise that he didn't love her and that he was not a "hero of
romance." Notice how he did this from the very first moment she had agreed to elope with
him:
She
cannot accuse me of showing one bit of deceitful softness. The first thing she saw me
do, on coming out of the Grange, was to hang up her little dog; and when she pleaded for
it, the first words I uttered were a wish that I had the hanging of every being
belonging to her, except on: possible she took that exception for
herself.
The dog hanging
incident therefore is a perfect example of the brutality of Heathcliff's character, and
how he chose to marry Isabella only because it was part of his plot to gain revenge on
Linton and have a chance of inheriting Thrushcross Grange. This is an excellent example
of how he coldly and calculatingly uses other characters, treating them as little better
than objects, to further his own goals.
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