ection with Barton and hay, set off
trotting across the field, followed at a discreet pace by all the
milking-cows. In the distance, with the help of a little imagination,
they made quite a formidable array.

"We are outnumbered! There is no dishonour in flight!" shouted Madge
in the grand phrases gained from books, that were always employed on
these occasions. "Rush for the fort!" she continued. "The fort under
the oak-tree!"

The children needed no further instructions. They had well-established
settlements under several of the trees, consisting of fallen branches
that had been chopped into logs and piled in a heap to remain there
until wanted. In a few minutes more they were defying elephants and
everything else from the summit of a log-pile fully five feet high,
their backs planted firmly against the solid trunk of the oak-tree. So
safe did they feel that it was annoying of the cows not to come on
faster, and they took it as nothing short of a direct insult when the
leading heifer, to whom they had all along alluded as a mad bull, gave
up the pursuit and began quietly to eat.

"There's no spirit in anything, elephants or bulls! I never saw
anything like it!" said Madge in a tone of utter disgust. "If they
won't run away how can one hunt them?"

"But what is that coming in and out of the farmyard doorway? It isn't
there always," said John, screwing up his eyes and trying to see across
the field in the blinding sunshine.

"I think it's a dog! I am almost sure it is," observed Betty
nervously. "I do hope it is not a mad dog that has strayed in off the
road."

"That's not very likely," laughed Madge. "There aren't many mad dogs
on the road, in fact I know people are obliged to keep them shut up at
home, or muzzled, or--"

"Yes, I dare say that is the rule. But suppose this one had escaped
without anybody noticing him?" said Betty, who was very much afraid of
dogs; "and suppose he smelt us out, and followed us down here?"

"Well, I should just pat him on the head," said Madge loftily. "You
can make friends with any dog if you aren't afraid of him."

"I say!" exclaimed John suddenly. "It's that brute belonging to the
butcher, that bit the postman. He is wandering about the field, I can
see him quite plainly. The butcher must be in the yard talking to
Barton about buying the calf. I think we had better run back to the
house." Even the courageous Madge prepared to act on this suggestion.
They