ning between his legs and
upsetting him, in her agonies of joy.

'Forward! Whither you will, old lady! The world is wide. You shall be
my guide, tutor, queen of philosophy, for the sake of this mere common
sense of yours. Forward, you new Hypatia! I promise you I will attend no
lectures but yours this day!'

He toiled on, every now and then stepping across a dead body, or
clambering a wall out of the road, to avoid some plunging, shrieking
horse, or obscene knot of prowling camp followers, who were already
stripping and plundering the slain.... At last, in front of a large
villa, now a black and smoking skeleton, he leaped a wall, and found
himself landed on a heap of corpses.... They were piled up against the
garden fence for many yards. The struggle had been fierce there some
three hours before.

'Put me out of my misery! In mercy kill me!' moaned a voice beneath his
feet.

Raphael looked down; the poor wretch was slashed and mutilated beyond
all hope.

'Certainly, friend, if you wish it,' and he drew his dagger. The poor
fellow stretched out his throat, and awaited the stroke with a ghastly
smile. Raphael caught his eye; his heart failed him, and he rose.

'What do you advise, Bran?' But the dog was far ahead, leaping and
barking impatiently.

'I obey,' said Raphael; and he followed her, while the wounded man
called piteously and upbraidingly after him.

'He will not have long to wait. Those plunderers will not be as
squeamish as I.... Strange, now! From Armenian reminiscences I should
have fancied myself as free from such tender weakness as any of
my Canaanite-slaying ancestors.... And yet by some mere spirit of
contradiction, I couldn't kill that fellow, exactly because he asked me
to do it.... There is more in that than will fit into the great inverted
pyramid of "I am I.". Never mind, let me get the dog's lessons by heart
first. What next, Bran? Ah! Could one believe the transformation? Why,
this is the very trim villa which I passed yesterday morning, with the
garden-chairs standing among the flower-beds, just as the young ladies
had left them, and the peacocks and silver pheasants running about,
wondering why their pretty mistresses did not come to feed them. And
here is a trampled mass of wreck and corruption for the girls to find,
when they venture back from Rome, and complain how horrible war is for
breaking down all their shrubs, and how cruel soldiers must be to kill
and cook all their poor dear