men, had not the
least fear of any successful assault upon Mount Pleasant; but he
resolved, when the time came, to take every possible precaution against
attacks upon the animals. He ordered that the iron gates of the
enclosures should be padlocked at night, and that some of the native
dogs should be chained there as sentinels. He looked forward with some
little anxiety to the Indian moon, as it is called, because, when he had
ridden out with Lopez and two of their Canterbury friends to the scene
of the encounter a few days after it had taken place, they found that
the Indians had fled so precipitately upon the loss of their horses,
that they had not even buried the bodies of their friends, and that,
short as the time had been, the foxes had left nothing but a few bones
remaining of these. From the mocassins, however, and from other relics
of the Indians strewn about, Lopez had pronounced at once that two
tribes had been engaged in the fray: the one, inhabitants of the
Pampas,--a people which, although ready to murder any solitary whites,
seldom attack a prepared foe; and the other, of Indians from the west,
of a far more warlike and courageous character. The former tribe, Lopez
affirmed,--and the natives of the country agreed with him,--would not of
themselves have been likely to attempt a fresh attack upon antagonists
who had proved themselves so formidable, but the latter would be almost
certain to make some desperate attempt to wipe off the disgrace of their
defeat. Under these circumstances, although perfectly confident of their
power to beat off any attack, it was resolved that every precaution
should be taken when the time approached.

Late one afternoon, however, Mr. Fitzgerald had gone out for a ride with
Mr. Hardy. Charley had gone down to the dam with his gun on his
shoulder, and Hubert had ridden to a pool in the river at some distance
off, where he had the day before observed a wild duck, which he believed
to be a new sort. The cattle and flocks had just been driven in by Lopez
and two mounted peons at an earlier hour than usual, as Mr. Hardy had
that morning given orders that the animals were all to be in their
enclosures before dusk. The labourers in the fields below were still at
work ploughing. Ethel was in the sitting-room working with Mrs. Hardy,
while Maud was in the garden picking some fruit for tea.

Presently the occupants of the parlour were startled by a sharp cry from
Maud, and in another ins