cried the Boy distressedly. "Oh dear, oh
dear, how stupid men are when they get an idea into their heads! I tell
you he's a good dragon, and a friend of mine, and tells me the most
beautiful stories you ever heard, all about old times and when he was
little. And he's been so kind to mother, and mother'd do anything for
him. And father likes him too, though father doesn't hold with art and
poetry much, and always falls asleep when the dragon starts talking
about style. But the fact is, nobody can help liking him when once they
know him. He's so engaging and so trustful, and as simple as a child!"

"Sit down, and draw your chair up," said St. George. "I like a fellow
who sticks up for his friends, and I'm sure the dragon has his good
points, if he's got a friend like you. But that's not the question. All
this evening I've been listening, with grief and anguish unspeakable, to
tales of murder, theft, and wrong; rather too highly coloured, perhaps,
not always quite convincing, but forming in the main a most serious roll
of crime. History teaches us that the greatest rascals often possess all
the domestic virtues; and I fear that your cultivated friend, in spite
of the qualities which have won (and rightly) your regard, has got to be
speedily exterminated."

"Oh, you've been taking in all the yarns those fellows have been telling
you," said the Boy impatiently. "Why, our villagers are the biggest
story-tellers in all the country round. It's a known fact. You're a
stranger in these parts, or else you'd have heard it already. All
they want is a fight. They're the most awful beggars for getting up
fights--it 's meat and drink to them. Dogs, bulls, dragons--anything
so long as it's a fight. Why, they've got a poor innocent badger in the
stable behind here, at this moment. They were going to have some fun
with him to-day, but they're saving him up now till your little affair's
over. And I've no doubt they've been telling you what a hero you were,
and how you were bound to win, in the cause of right and justice, and so
on; but let me tell you, I came down the street just now, and they were
betting six to four on the dragon freely!"

"Six to four on the dragon!" murmured St. George sadly, resting his
cheek on his hand. "This is an evil world, and sometimes I begin to
think that all the wickedness in it is not entirely bottled up inside
the dragons. And yet--may not this wily beast have misled you as to his
real character, in orde