In the 1773 play She Stoops to Conquer by Oliver Goldsmith, Tony Lumpkin tells the audience that his step father, Mr. Hardcastle, has been calling him "whelp" and "hound," but the audience doesn't actually hear Mr. Hardcastle make any insults directly to Tony that could lead to the prank.
Tony's full disclosure of his step father's opinion of him comes in act one scene two when he states,
Father-in-law has been calling me whelp, and hound, this half year. Now, if pleased, I could be so revenged upon the old grumbletonian. But then I'm afraid-afraid of what? I shall soon be worth fifteen hundred a year, and let him frighten me out of that if he can.
Mr. Hardcastle's negative attitude towards Tony, however, is apparent from the opening scene when he tells his wife—Tony's mother—that "the alehouse and the stable are the only schools he'll ever go to."...
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When Tony enters to say he is going to the bar to drink with his friends, Mr. Hardcastle doesn't really say anything that sounds negative on paper, but due to what he said previously, the audience can feel the hate and tension in his words when he tells Tony, "Ay; the alehouse, the old place: I thought so."
In Act I scene 2, Tony seizes upon the opportunity that fate has delivered into his hands to get his own back against his stepfather. The arrival of Marlow, the man that Mr. Hardcastle plans to marry his daughter, Kate, gives Tony the perfect opportunity to play a trick on both Marlow but also more importantly Mr. Hardcastle, by telling Marlow and Hastings that the Hardcastle's house is actually an inn and that Mr. Hardcastle is actually a member of the working class who gives himself airs and believes he is situated higher in society than he actually is. Note what Tony says to himself as he conceives of this plan:
Father-in-law has been calling me whelp and hound this half-year. Now, if I pleased, I could be so revenged upon the old grumbletonian.
Thus Mr. Hardcastle has been calling Tony "whelp" and "hound," and indeed when we first see Hardcastle and Tony with his mother, Hardcastle clearly does not have a very high opinion of Tony's character, particularly when he says he is heading to the alehouse.