was there in force--four of him. Four delirious hunts of four minutes
each--four hounds per fox--ended in four earths just above the river.
All the village looked on.

"We forgot about the earths. The banks are riddled with 'em. This'll
defeat us," said the Inspector.

"Wait a moment!" The Governor drew forth a sneezing hound. "I've just
remembered I'm Governor of these parts."

"Then turn out a black battalion to stop for us. We'll need 'em, old
man."

The Governor straightened his back. "Give ear, O people!" he cried. "I
make a new Law!"

The villagers closed in. He called:--

"Henceforward I will give one dollar to the man on whose land Abu
Hussein is found. And another dollar"--he held up the coin--"to the man
on whose land these dogs shall kill him. But to the man on whose land
Abu Hussein shall run into a hole such as is this hole, I will give not
dollars, but a most unmeasurable beating. Is it understood?"

"Our Excellency," a man stepped forth, "on my land Abu Hussein was found
this morning. Is it not so, brothers?"

None denied. The Governor tossed him over four dollars without a word.

"On my land they all went into their holes," cried another. "Therefore I
must be beaten."

"Not so. The land is mine, and mine are the beatings."

This second speaker thrust forward his shoulders already bared, and the
villagers shouted.

"Hullo! Two men anxious to be licked? There must be some swindle about
the land," said the Governor. Then in the local vernacular: "What are
your rights to the beating?"

As a river-reach changes beneath a slant of the sun, that which had been
a scattered mob changed to a court of most ancient justice. The hounds
tore and sobbed at Abu Hussein's hearthstone, all unnoticed among
the legs of the witnesses, and Gihon, also accustomed to laws, purred
approval.

"You will not wait till the Judges come up the river to settle the
dispute?" said the Governor at last.

"No!" shouted all the village save the man who had first asked to be
beaten. "We will abide by Our Excellency's decision. Let Our Excellency
turn out the creatures of the Emirs who stole our land in the days of
the Oppression."

"And thou sayest?" the Governor turned to the man who had first asked to
be beaten.

"I say 1 will wait till the wise Judges come down in the steamer. Then I
will bring my many witnesses," he replied.

"He is rich. He will bring many witnesses," the village Sheikh muttered.

"No need. Thy