cake
of crocodiles' eggs, millet-seed, and sugar-candy to the lions. This is
a dainty which lions can never resist, and running greedily at it, with
four tremendous snaps, they got hold of each other by their jaws, and
their eight rows of teeth were locked fast in a grim and deadly _struggle
for existence_!

The Dwarf took in the affair at a glance.

"Cursed be he who taught you this!" he cried, and then whistled in a
shrill and vulgar manner on his very dirty fingers. At his call rushed
up an enormous Spanish cat, ready saddled and bridled, and darting fire
from its eyes. To leap on its back, while Ricardo sprang on his own
steed, was to the active Dwarf the work of a moment. Then clapping spurs
to its sides (his spurs grew naturally on his bare heels, horrible to
relate, like a cock's spurs) and taking his cat by the head, the Dwarf
forced it to leap on to Ricardo's saddle. The diamond sword which slew
the king of the Golden Mines--that invincible sword which hews iron like
a reed--was up and flashing in the air!

At this very moment King Prigio, seeing, in the magic globe, all that
passed, and despairing of Ricardo's life, was just about to wish the
dwarf at Jericho, when through the open window, with a tremendous whirr,
came a huge vulture, and knocked the king's wishing cap off! Wishing was
now of no use.

This odious fowl was the Fairy of the Desert, the Dwarf's trusted ally in
every sort of mischief. The vulture flew instantly out of the window;
and ah! with what awful anxiety the king again turned his eyes on the
crystal ball only a parent's heart can know. Should he see Ricardo
bleeding at the feet of the abominable dwarf? The king scarcely dared to
look; never before had he known the nature of fear. However, look he
did, and saw the dwarf un-catted, and Pepper, the gallant Dandie Dinmont,
with his teeth in the throat of the monstrous Spanish cat.

No sooner had he seen the cat leap on his master's saddle-bow than
Pepper, true to the instinct of his race, sprang at its neck, just behind
the head--the usual place,--and, with an awful and despairing mew, the
cat (Peter was its name) gave up its life.

The dwarf was on his feet in a moment, waving the diamond sword, which
lighted up the whole scene, and yelling taunts. Pepper was flying at his
heels, and, with great agility, was keeping out of the way of the
invincible blade.

"Ah!" screamed the Dwarf as Pepper got him by the ankle. "Call off y