lightly at first, then hard; and I looked about me, wanting some place to take refuge in, or a car to ride — and found none.

I tried to run — and behold, a dog, and a second, and a third, appearing before me all at once from I know not where. Each one the size of a savage wolf. And I do not deny that a great fear came over me.

The street long, the night dark, the rain washing my head and my face, and three wolfish dogs surrounding me and not letting me move — my slightest motion stirred their barking and set their fangs ready for work. And something had to be done.

I thought quickly, then found myself stretching out a hand to the nearest of the dogs, stroking his wet head with it.

And I repeated the stroke once, and twice, and again — and behold, he bowed his head, then rubbed himself against my feet. Yes, he responded — and with such speed. And he was the biggest of the three, and the strongest.

I found that the operation of taming him had succeeded, so I dared to move a step, and he did not oppose me; he let me go on — indeed, he stood up to the other two when they tried to follow me. And I reached home and breathed a deep sigh of relief, dripping with water.

What a night it was! The important thing is that the dog became my friend, and I hardly pass along the

street before he comes toward me, wagging his tail, to remind me of the gentle touch. O miracle of love!

He opened his eyes upon this friend — a rooster he loved; he stroked its colored feathers with his small hand, and fed into its red beak whatever his hand could reach of sweets and grain. A rooster and a

child: a charming pair, a speaking proof of the life of childhood and its triumph over differences of kind for the sake of a great affection, and a beautiful symbol of innocent childish fellow-feeling.

And one day the little one opened his eyes, and in the rooster's place — emptiness. He missed its crowing, and could not believe the sun, or trust that the day, without the rooster's voice, had truly risen.

And he kept turning two sweet black eyes about, searching for the vanished friend; but he did not know — until noon came — that the cook's knife had made of the rooster a feast. He did not eat, of course, for he was too occupied with the anguish of loss to feel his hunger.

And the strange thing is that his family kept wondering how the child could go hungry, and forbid himself thereafter the taste of meat, for fear it might be the flesh of a rooster. Their minds refuse to believe that a rooster could be, to a small human being, anything other than a thing to be eaten.