ts he generally loved were flavourless.

All he felt disposed to do was to turn himself into a young modern
ascetic, prick his legs well in going through the furze, and then take a
little bark off his shins in climbing twenty feet up on to the great
monolith, and there sit and grump.

"Bother the dog, what a row he's making!" he muttered. "I wish I hadn't
brought him."

Then his lips parted to shout to Grip to be quiet, but he did not utter
the words, for he stopped short just as he neared the first stone of the
circle, on hearing the dog begin to bark furiously again, and a savage
voice roar loudly,--

"Get out, or I'll crush your head with this stone!"

CHAPTER TWENTY.

A DOUBTFUL ACQUAINTANCE.

Gwyn recognised the voice, and knew what was the matter, and his first
aim was to make a rush to protect his dog from the crushing blow which
would probably be given him with one of the many weather-worn fragments
of granite lying about among the great monoliths. But he was just where
he could not make such a rush, for it would have been into a dense bed
of gorse as high as himself, and forming a _chevaux de frise_ of
millions of sharp thorns.

The next best plan was to shout loudly, "You hurt my dog if you dare--"
though the man might dare, and cast the stone all the same.

But Gwyn did neither of these things, for another familiar voice rose
from beyond the furze, crying loudly,--

"You let that dog alone! You touch him and I'll set him to worry you.
Once he gets his teeth into you, he won't let go. Here, Grip! Come to
heel!"

"Well done, Joe!" muttered Gwyn, who felt that his dog was safe; and he
ran to the end of the bank of prickly growth, where there was an
opening, and suddenly appeared upon the scene.

It was all just as he had pictured; there was Joe Jollivet, with Grip
close to his legs, barking angrily and making short rushes, and there, a
few yards away, stood the big, swarthy stranger who had been caught at
the mine mouth, and whom Gwyn believed to have tampered with the furnace
door, now standing with a big stone of eight or ten pounds' weight,
ready to hurl at the dog if attacked.

"Here, you put down that stone," cried Gwyn, angrily. "How dare you
threaten my dog!"

"Stone aren't yours," said the man, tauntingly. "This ground don't
belong to you. Keep your mongrel cur quiet."

"My dog wouldn't interfere with you if you let it alone."

"Oh, it's your dog, is it?" said the man. "