I don't want to anthropomorphize dogs but the stories involving dogs sacrificing themselves to save humans are legion. Dogs who fight bears to save their master, tiny dogs who jump burglars, police dogs that jump gunmen without any instruction.

Seems many dogs are genetically, if not behaviorally, predisposed to being sensitive to their master's desires to the point of self-sacrifice. For them it is their place and job. Kind of like firemen running into a burning building. In that context, assuming the category allies at all to the psychology of dogs, I doubt that the dogs themselves wouldn't consider it a "pity".

IMO dogs are in an intimate genetic and behavioral dance with humans, and have been for something along the lines of four thousand years. Humans wouldn't have prospered so well without dogs, we may have learned organized hunting form dogs, and dogs have benefited from their status as pets and partners in work.