ter, under which the crows would be afraid to pass.
Otherwise, as Bill well knew, Jess would have been like to lose her
eyes before she had lain there very long.

After Bill's departure, the crows were the first to descend upon
the camp; and they soon had the meat left for Finn torn to shreds
and swallowed. Then they swaggered impudently about the fire,
picking up crumbs, a process they were in the habit of attending to
daily during Finn's absence. The presence of these wicked black
marauders gave courage to the waiting dingoes, and they determined
to proceed at once with the business in hand: the examination of
the dying kangaroo-hound of which they had heard. As for the huge
spectral wolf, it was evident that he had no real connection with
the camp. Indeed, the bigger of the three dingoes told himself,
with a regretful sigh, that this great grey wolf had in all
probability dispatched the kangaroo-hound at an early stage of the
night, and had been sleeping off the first effects of his orgy,
when they first saw him lying near the camp-fire. At all events,
the wolf had disappeared.

The three dingoes advanced, still exhibiting caution in every step,
but marching abreast, because neither would give any advantage to
the others in a case of this sort. When they got to within
five-and-twenty paces of the shelter, poor Jess winded them, and it
was borne in upon her that the hour of her last fight had arrived.
She knew herself unable to run a yard, probably unable to stand; and
the dingo scent, as she understood it, had no hint of mercy in it.
With an effort which racked her whole frame with burning pain, the
helpless bitch turned upon her chest and raised her head so that
she might see her doom approaching. She gave a little gulp when her
eyes fell upon the stalwart forms of no fewer than three full-grown
dingoes, stocky of build, massive in legs and shoulders,
plentifully coated, and fanged for the killing of meat. Their eyes
had the killing light in them too, Jess thought; and a snarl curled
her writhen lips as she pictured her end, stretched helpless there
under the bark shelter. Well she knew that even three such
well-grown dingoes as these would never have dared to attack her if
she had been in normal condition.

Very slowly the three dingoes approached a little nearer in
fan-shaped formation, and, with a brave effort, Jess succeeded in
bringing forth a bark which ended in something between growl and
howl, by reason