;
I was never so near being torn to pieces before, not even in my fight
with the ferret!"

"I'll never go near a house in daylight again!" exclaimed I, still
trembling with excitement and terror. Whiskerandos appeared to feel the
effects of the fright less than I did, though his danger had been so
much greater.

"It is your thirst that makes you so nervous," said he; "you have not
yet recovered from our voyage on the barrel. There seems to be a wet
ditch around this field; come and moisten your nose in the water."

The relief was certainly great, and as I drank the cool liquid, I felt
my spirits revive.

"I wonder where we are now!" said I.

"I have no doubt on the subject,-- we are in old England again! The look
of the house, the hedges, the fields, that young fellow--"

"Oh! don't speak of him!" I exclaimed, "cruel, barbarous monster that
he is!"

"You are too hard on him," said Whiskerandos, in his own frank,
good-humoured manner. "He may be no worse than the rest of his species,
who think that there is no harm in being cruel to a rat. I suspect that
even your blue-eyed friend would shout with joy to see a cat worry a
mouse!"

"I don't believe it!" I replied indignantly; "a generous and noble heart
can never take pleasure in seeing pain inflicted on a poor defenceless
creature!"

"Ah, but--" Whiskerandos commenced, but our conversation was suddenly
interrupted by a little squeak from the hedge close behind us.

"I think that I know that voice!" exclaimed I, and I had hardly uttered
the sentence ere from the thick covert sprang the well-remembered form
of Bright-eyes!

CHAPTER XXI.

A NEW KIND OF WATCH-DOG.

What a rubbing of noses ensued! after all my travels and perils it was
such joy to see again the face of a friend! I had so much also to
relate, (I have ever been a loquacious rat,) that I almost lost breath
in my long narration. I wound up my account with a description of the
last adventure of Whiskerandos, who was now, in my eyes, ten times more
a hero than before.

"And now that I have told you my news," said I, "let's hear a little of
yours. In the first place, where is old Oddity?"

Bright-eyes hung down his head, and drooped his long tail in a touching
and melancholy manner. Such conduct in so lively a rat showed me at once
that my last surviving brother was dead!

"How did it happen?" was all that I could say.

"Not a week after our arrival in these parts, he was caught in a