rns, and is at once petrified by what she sees.

They notice the look of horror on her lovely face, and instinctively
guessing, also cast a glance in the direction where last the savage
brute was seen.

He has continued to advance in the interim, and is now quite close,
though not moving out of the straight line in the center of the
street--a repulsive looking object truly, and enough to horrify the
bravest.

Colonel Lionel gives a gasp. He is trembling all over, for it chances
that this brave soldier, who has led forlorn hopes in the Zulu war, and
performed prodigies of valor on Egyptian battle-fields, has a peculiar
dread of dogs, inherited from one of his parents.

It is not the animal that has fixed Lady Ruth's attention. Just in front
and directly in the line of the dog's advance is a small native child
that has been playing in the street.

He cannot be over three years of age, and with his curly black head and
half-naked body presents a picture of robust health.

Apparently engrossed in his play, he sees and hears nothing of the clamor
around until, chancing to look up, he sees the dog, and fearlessly
extends his chubby arms toward it.

The picture is one never to be forgotten.

It thrills every one who looks on.

No one seems to have a gun or weapon of any kind. A peculiar paralysis
affects them, a feeling of dumb horror.

A shriek sounds; from a window is seen the form of a native woman, who
wrings her hands in terrible anguish.

The child's mother! God pity her! to be an eye-witness of her darling's
fate!

Lady Ruth turns to the colonel, to the man who so recently proudly
declared that no English woman ever asked a favor that a British officer
would not grant, no matter what the risk.

"Save the darling!" her pallid lips utter.

He trembles all over, groans, takes a couple of tottering steps
forward, and then leans against the wall for support.

"I cannot," he gasps.

Other Britons there are who would be equal to the emergency. Mortal man
has never done aught in this world that Englishmen dare not imitate, and
indeed they generally lead. It is unfortunate for England that an
antipathy for dogs runs in the Blunt family.

This time Lady Ruth does not say "coward," but her face expresses the
fine contempt she feels. With that mother's shrieks in her ears, what
can she think of a man who will hesitate to save a sweet child, even
at the risk of meeting the most terrible death known to the world