hich one would have been
taken by the runaway. As they rode on, they still looked ahead. At
every turn in the road they still expected to see the fugitive;
and it was not until the donkeys themselves gave signs of fatigue,
that they were willing to slacken their pace. But the nature of
these donkeys was, after all, but mortal; like other mortal things,
they were subject to weakness and fatigue; and as they were now
exhausted, their riders were compelled to indulge them with a
breathing space, and so they slackened their pace to a walk.

And now they all began to consider the probabilities of Bob's
fortunes.

"I'm afraid something's happened," said Clive. "Perhaps he's been
thrown."

"Thrown?" cried Frank, cheerily. "Why, if so, we would have found
him long ago. But the idea of Bob being thrown from any animal that
ever lived is simply absurd. Hell stick to that donkey as long as
the donkey runs."

"It seems to me," said David,--who was a very thoughtful and
observant boy,--"it seems to me that the donkey may have taken some
of those roads that go off to the mountains."

"Pooh!" said Frank. "Why should the donkey take the trouble to do
anything of that sort? A runaway animal don't generally indulge in
freaks of that kind. He generally goes it blind, and runs straight
ahead along the road that happens to be before him."

"But perhaps he lives among the mountains," said David, "and, in
that case, he would merely be running home."

"I don't believe that," said Frank. "I hold that it requires some
thought for an ordinary donkey to quit the high road, and take one
of those by-roads."

"Not if a by-road leads to his home."

"But how could his home be there," objected Frank, "when we found
him away down there near Paestum?"

"Easily enough," said David. "I dare say they were going home at
the very time we came up with them."

"I wish we could ask the boy about it," said Clive. "He could tell
as just what we want to know."

"Yes," said Frank; "but, unfortunately, we couldn't understand all
of it."

David heaved a sigh.

"How I wish," he exclaimed, "that I had studied Italian before I
came! But from this time forth, I'm determined not to rest till
I've learned the language."

Uncle Moses was deeply distressed at Bob's disappearance. He had
only one idea in his mind. He told the other boys what it was. It
was the idea of brigands. They had met poor Bob; they had seized
him, and had carried him off to their l