ng at the way in which this was said, although
he was sufficiently impressed with the hopelessness, it might even be
the danger, of the attempt he was about to make.

They found no difficulty in approaching to within about thirty yards of
the animal, being well concealed by the line of bushes before mentioned,
but beyond that point there was no cover. Here therefore Mark cocked
his gun and gathered himself up for a rush, and Hockins drew his
cutlass. So agile was our young doctor that he actually reduced the
thirty yards to ten before the astonished bull turned to fly. Another
moment and the contents of both barrels were lodged in its flank. The
effect was to produce a bellow of rage, a toss-up of the hindquarters,
and a wild flourish of the tail, as the animal scurried away after the
rest of the herd, which was in full flight.

Poor Breezy stopped at once, with a feeling of mingled disgust and
despair. Ebony also stopped, and looked with wide sympathetic eyes in
his leader's face, as though to say, "Well, massa, you's done your
best."

But Hockins ran on with persistent vigour, although the creature was
leaving him further behind at every stride.

"Absurd!" murmured Mark, as he gazed at him.

"No use wassomiver," said Ebony.

It did indeed seem as if the seaman's exertions would prove abortive,
but something in the spirit of the wounded bull suddenly changed the
aspect of affairs. Whether it was the stinging pain of the small shot
in its flank, or the indignation in its breast that influenced it we
cannot tell, but in a moment it wheeled round with a furious roar and
charged its pursuer.

Hockins stopped at once, and his comrades fully expected to see him turn
and run; but our seaman was made of better stuff than they gave him
credit for, and the situation was not so new to him as they imagined.
In the course of his voyaging to many lands, Hockins had been to a
bull-fight in South America. He had seen with fascination and some
surprise the risks run by the footmen in the arena; he had beheld with
mingled anger and disgust the action of the picadors, who allowed their
poor horses to be gored to death by the infuriated bulls; and he had
watched with thrilling anxiety, not unmingled with admiration, the cool
courage of the matadors, as they calmly stood up to the maddened and
charging bulls and received them on the points of their swords, stepping
lightly aside at the same moment so as to avoid the dangerou