mbling at the latch of the
headsman's door, and the chained dog within the courtyard, scenting a
stranger, gives him a hostile greeting.

"Who is there?" inquires from within an unpleasant, hoarsely screeching
voice, the owner whereof at the same time soothing the big dog which,
snarling fiercely, thrusts his nose between the door and the lintel, and
snaps from time to time through the opening.

"Open the door, Mekipiros, and don't bawl!" answers one of the new
arrivals, impatiently beating with his fists upon the door. "There's no
necessity for closing the door either, for who is likely to come? Even
if you left it wide open, nobody would stray in, I'll be bound, save
your pal, Old Nick, and here he is."

At this well-known voice the wolf-hound ceased to bark, and when the
door was opened leaped joyously upon the neck of the new-comer, whining
and sniffing.

"Send this filthy sea-bear to the deuce, Mekipiros, can't you? It's
licking my very nose off."

The person so addressed was a curious sport of nature. It was a
square-set creature dressed completely in women's clothes. Its features
were those of a semi-bestial type. It had an immense round head covered
with short, tangled, unkempt hair, a large broad mouth, a stumpy,
wide-spreading nose, a projecting forehead furrowed with deep wrinkles,
thick bushy eyebrows, and one half of the horny-skinned face was covered
by immature furry whiskers. And this masculine creature wore women's
clothes! On perceiving the new-comer, it seized the yelping dog, big as
a calf though it was, by the chain with a bony hand and hurled it
backwards, grinning and grunting all the time without any apparent
cause.

"Come! go in and don't stand staring aimlessly about," said the
new-comer turning to his comrade, who was standing in melancholy
amazement on the threshold, wrapped up in a large mantle, with a
broad-brimmed hat on his head.

The dog accompanied the guests as far as the door of his kennel,
sniffing all the time at the heels of the stranger, whilst the gabbling
Mekipiros tugged away at its chain. A hideous moustache had been painted
on the monster's lip either with blood or red chalk, and he tried to
call attention to it with extreme self-satisfaction.

"Is the master at home, or the missus, eh! Mekipiros?" inquired the
first-comer.

"The master is singing and the mistress is dancing," replied the
half-man with a bestial chuckle.

"Tell them that we have arrived, come! o