sounded more like a rallying cry.

For, dulled as were his ears, they were still keener than any human's.
And they had caught the sound of eight flying paws amid the dead leaves
of the drive. Wolf and Bruce, coming home at a leisurely trot, from
their ramble in the forest, had heard the two reports of the shotgun;
and had broken into a run. They read the meaning in Lad's exhausted
bark, as clearly as humans might read a printed word. And it lent wings
to their feet.

Around the corner of the house tore the two returning collies. In a
single glance, they seemed to take in the whole grisly scene. They,
too, had had their bouts with marauding swine; and they were still
young enough to enjoy such clashes and to partake of them without
danger.

The sow, too blind with pain and rage to know reinforcements were
coming to the aid of the half-dead hero, tore forward. The Mistress,
with both hands, sought to drag Lad behind her. The maids screeched in
plangent chorus.

Then, just as the sow was launching herself on the futilely snapping
Lad, she was stupidly aware that the dog had somehow changed to three
dogs. One of these three the Mistress was still holding. The two
others, with excellent teamwork, were assailing the sow from opposite
sides.

She came to a sliding stop in her charge; blinking in bewildered fury.

Bruce had caught her by the torn left ear; and was keeping easily out
of her way, while he inflicted torture thereon. Wolf, like a furry
whirlwind, had stopped only long enough to slash her bleeding nose to
the bone; and now was tearing away at her hind leg in an industrious
and very promising effort to hamstring her. In front, Lad was still
straining to break the Mistress's loving hold; and to get at his
pestered enemy.

This was more than the huge porker had bargained for. Through all her
murder-rage, she had sense enough to know she was outnumbered and
beaten. She broke into a clumsy gallop; heading homeward.

But Bruce and Wolf would not have it so. Delightedly they tore in to
the attack. Their slashing fangs and their keenly nipping front teeth
were everywhere. They were all over her. In sudden panic, blinded by
terror and pain, the sow put her six hundred pounds of unwieldy weight
into the fastest motion she could summon. At a scrambling run, she set
off, around the house; head down, bitten tail aloft; the two dogs at
her bleeding haunches.

Dimly, she saw a big and black obstacle loom up in her pat