ellent sense of direction, which has been
greatly perfected by the years I have spent in the mountains and upon
the plains and deserts of my native state, so that it was with little
or no difficulty that I found my way back to the hut in which I had
left Ajor. As I entered the doorway, I called her name aloud. There
was no response. I drew a box of matches from my pocket and struck a
light and as the flame flared up, a half-dozen brawny warriors leaped
upon me from as many directions; but even in the brief instant that the
flare lasted, I saw that Ajor was not within the hut, and that my arms
and ammunition had been removed.

As the six men leaped upon me, an angry growl burst from behind them.
I had forgotten Nobs. Like a demon of hate he sprang among those
Kro-lu fighting-men, tearing, rending, ripping with his long tusks and
his mighty jaws. They had me down in an instant, and it goes without
saying that the six of them could have kept me there had it not been
for Nobs; but while I was struggling to throw them off, Nobs was
springing first upon one and then upon another of them until they were
so put to it to preserve their hides and their lives from him that they
could give me only a small part of their attention. One of them was
assiduously attempting to strike me on the head with his stone hatchet;
but I caught his arm and at the same time turned over upon my belly,
after which it took but an instant to get my feet under me and rise
suddenly.

As I did so, I kept a grip upon the man's arm, carrying it over one
shoulder. Then I leaned suddenly forward and hurled my antagonist over
my head to a hasty fall at the opposite side of the hut. In the dim
light of the interior I saw that Nobs had already accounted for one of
the others--one who lay very quiet upon the floor--while the four
remaining upon their feet were striking at him with knives and hatchets.

Running to one side of the man I had just put out of the fighting, I
seized his hatchet and knife, and in another moment was in the thick of
the argument. I was no match for these savage warriors with their own
weapons and would soon have gone down to ignominious defeat and death
had it not been for Nobs, who alone was a match for the four of them.
I never saw any creature so quick upon its feet as was that great
Airedale, nor such frightful ferocity as he manifested in his attacks.
It was as much the latter as the former which contributed to the
undoin