obeyed," boasted the horseman, drawing himself up.

"Very well, Krikor, I fear you will be forced to accustom yourself to being disobeyed if you remain long in my company. You may be a little tyrant among your own band of cutthroats, but you must remember that Garabed Ekmekdjian calls no chief." And with this introduction the newcomer leaped from his horse and approaching the bandit continued: bandit continued: "But what is this, Krikor? By my soul, I" wager he's carrying away somebody's grandmother." And he And he indicated the black-robed figure that stood immovable by Krikor's side.

"No; by God, it's the most beautiful girl in Erziroum. I destroyed a whole village; put men to the sword, raped women, and dashed the brains of little children against the stones in the pavement, in order to get this girl," flashed Krikor in reply.

"Yes, as ever a braggart, I see. Why, in my town, when they say 'boastful as Krikor Karakashian,' we all understand. Oh! it's a good joke, an excellent joke." Garabed laughed unroariously.

"But," he continued, seeing the gathering anger in Krikor's face, and wishing to irritate him still further, "if you wish to cross the border yourself, I'm going that way. You can just leave your grandmother here and get on my horse with me, and I will carry you across."

Fierce, blinding wrath seized Krikor at the continued taunts of Garabed. "Look, you lying dog," he cried, and grasping the head-coverings of the black figure which stood silently at his side, with one quick wrench he tore them from her, leaving the face, head and streaming hair uncovered in the sunlight. It was a surpassingly beautiful face which he thus cruelly exposed to view, and the long golden hair was of wondrous shade and texture.

The Turkish soldier who was a witness to this this disgraceful interview swayed and put his hand to his head when his eyes fell upon the face of the girl, and as he stepped into the

open, her eyes met his and a glad light came into them.

"Hasseyn-brother!" she cried, and in the excess of her emotions burst into tears.

With the angered cry of a wild beast which flies to the protection of its young, Husseyn sprang at the throat of the bandit chief. A feeling of inexpressible satisfaction came over him as he felt his hands close over the Armenian's windpipe. Down, down, with all his strength, he pressed his thumbs into the man's jugular veins— pressed until his steel-like hands could feel the throat growing lax, and he could hear the gurgling sound as the breath pent up within his adversary's heaving chest labored to force an exit. The bandit's efforts to free himself grew weaker; the end of the struggle was near. Husseyn for an instant took his eyes off the face of his antagonist. His sister stood dryeyed now, as she breathlessly watched the struggle.

"Run, Djemile. Save yourself. Hide yourself," he cried, as suddenly he realized the overwhelming odds against which they would find themselves pitted in case other members of Krikor's band should arrive to find his sister there. The spell broken, Djemile obeyed.

At last Krikor's wildly gripping hands encountered the handle of the knife which hung from his belt. Once, twice, thrice, with rhythmic precision his arm rose and fell as he plunged the dagger into Husseyn's back. The dagger found his heart, but still Husseyn held on, and with his fast glazing eyes followed the flying form of his sister. At last, as by sheer force of will, he held within himself the soul which was struggling to be free; he felt the bandit's body grow limp within his grasp, and as it slithered to the dusty roadway, Husseyn's heroic soul was released, and his body lay stretched across that of the dead bandit.

Garabed Ekmekdjian lightly watched the death-struggle with a careless interest. When with a final quiver the body of Husseyn lay still,

he leaped to the saddle and in response to a twist of the rein and a touch of the spur, the well trained horse was galloping down the road in pursuit of the fleeing girl. Bending low in the saddle, the skilled rider with one arm seized the girl, and, placing her on the horse in front of himself, without checking his speed, wheeled about and spurring his horse sped away northward toward the border.

*

That evening when the muezzin climbed the stairway to the minaret of

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the little mosque in Osman's desolated village and called to the evening prayer, a trembling, stricken old man, old before his time, answered the call. With his face turned toward Mecca and his heart toward the ever-living God, the old man bowed his head and prayed, and as he prayed, it seemed that God's angels came, and standing on either side of the worshiper, ministered unto him. And a great peace entered into Osman's heart for God, the comforter, the merciful, was with him.. Next day they found him thus, dead. in the attitude of prayer.

I'

T WAS at my own request that Jack -our faithful old dog-was dispatched to the happy hunting grounds. Not because I found him at all hours of the day and night, with his nose pressed against the door of his dead master's empty room, whining piteously for admittance, and breaking into wild howls when denied entrance; I loved the beast all the more for his faithfulness and affection. But the infirmities of age were upon him; lame, half blind and wholly deaf from an incurable ailment of the ears, I felt that no one would care for him as his master and I had done, and I knew that a time had come when I should have to leave him to the mercy of others occasionally when my temporary absence from home became necessary.

So one afternoon when all was ready, I ran, as if for life, over to the doctor's, and just as Jack discovered I had gone, and came to the east door, out of his master's room, to look for me, a merciful ball from our neighbor's gun brought down the dog without a struggle.

I hope it is not wicked to speak of that first home coming after the dog's death. I could not help raising my eyes to the front veranda, and straining my ears for the quavering little cries and yelps, issuing from a grizzled, trembling old snout in which the teeth were chattering with excitement and impatience. "Hurry, hurry," he seemed to implore, "I want you to stroke my head and pat my back once more before I die, and you know I'm so lame it hurts me to climb down the steps. Come quick-come quick." And I used to run as fast as I could to reach him, while he beat the devil's

tatoo with his forepaws on the floor of the porch, and raised his half-blind, faithful old eyes to mine with the most humanly loving expression, when I could lay my hand on him at last.

I never wanted another dog, I said, after Jack died; it breaks one's heart to part with an old friend, even a fourfooted one. But every one who came to the house said: "The place is too lonesome without a dog; you must have a dog on the ranch by all means." Instead of that, I got a cat, though I really did not hanker after one at all.

I had spent the night at Villa Bergstedt, and in the cold gray of the early dawn I heard the most persistent and pitiful mew of a young kitten, and saw the little waif slipping along behind shrubs and plants, never for a moment ceasing in its wild appeal for food and shelter. Elsie Goldman said some one had "thrown it away," and she had managed to feed it yesterday after driving it up from the ravine to the house. On the instant I said: "I'll take the cat if you can catch it"perhaps not thinking that it could be done. But Elsie caught the cat, lugged it over to my house, and we spent the day and night "gentling" it. Though only in part successful, we nevertheless allowed the kitten the freedom of the ranch next day, and as she did not return at night, I was all the more pleased to find her on hand the morning following, though in a really and truly critical position. That is, Elsie, who can do anything and everything, had set a rat-trap, one of those flat, square little boards with a "snap" to it, and placed it in a box turned with its open side to the wall, on the back porch.

Softly tilting back this box, in the glad expectation of finding a defunct wood rat, I was startled to see instead a live kitten resting peacefully beside the deadly instrument. Careful as I was, the cat felt the box move, and sprang up in affright, jumped right across the trap and made tracks for the open, with that dreadful trap clamped fast to the extreme tip of her tail. I stood petrified for a moment, but was recalled to my senses by one wild yell and the clatter of the rat trap, which had caught against the shoescraper on the edge of the porch, detached itself from the pussey's tail and landed close beside me, after a hilarious spin in the air. Of course, there was no use calling "Kitty, Kitty" in my most persuasive tones. Kitty was out of reach in a very few seconds, and I went about mourning for the cat that might have become a pet,

So there was neither dog nor cat on the ranch; but after a day or two I thought I heard a faint "mee-ow" under the house, and I instantly went to the west side of the building, where three steps lead from my room on to the terrace. The steps lie along the side of the house, and just at the foot there was left an opening in the wall, low down on the ground, which opening is closed only by some short, loose boards. Crouching down on the terrace and removing these, I began to call and coax, eliciting at last another faint cat call, though never seeing a cat. But I carried milk to this opening, moved it inside and closed up the space again. After a little while the milk had vanished, and I put meat in the same place with the same result, and kept this up for days, rewarded sometimes by a "mew," but never a sight of the cat. At last, one day, toward evening, after I had heard repeated "mee-ows," I stepped, or rather rushed, as I always do, out on the back porch, coffee-pot in hand, full of cold water, luckily, which I was shaking vigorously prior to dashing it on the clump of guelder roses that stood against the north wall of the house. At that moment I noticed a white spot

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among the bushes, heading my way, and just as it flashed through my brain "The cat is coming to make friends," a gallon or two of cold water was flying through the air, and the next instant a soaked cat was hurling itself around the corner of the house and disappearing under the west side of it, anxious, evidently, to draw the sheltering boards in after it; at least they lay in a heap on the outside of the

open space.

Again the cat became invisible, this time for weeks, while it silently absorbed milk and meat as much as I could put under the house for it. Then came a lady to visit me, from San Jose, and as by this time the cat had learned to followed me from room to room, under the house, I startled this lady one day by holding conversation with an invisible cat.

"Oh, Kitty," I said, "why don't you come up and lie by the kitchen fire; it's so rainy and cold." Asked the lady in alarm: "Whom are you talking to?"

And I said: "To my cat, to be sure." "But you've got no cat," she said, positively. "Oh, yes, I have; only it's invisible." When I had related the details of the rat-trap incident, and the cold water accident, she said, "I know how to bring out that cat and gentle it for all time to come."

So we waited till one day the "meeows" were loud and numerous, and we both kneeled down on the terrace by the steps, and she held a long, slender switch, with which she was to tickle pussy's nose, and get it to play. Just as I was growing too hoarse to call any more, a white paw was thrust out from the gloom, and a white nose with a black smut across it, was stuck curiously forward. This was the moment for which my friend had waited. But alas! the end of the switch had gotten tangled up in some loose rose clippings, with the thorny side out, and gaining impetus from the weight, it came in sudden contact with the cat's head in so unexpected and overwhelming a manner that the cat-to-be-gentled fled in wildest dismay, and became inaudible as well as invisible

after the third attempt at civilization.. Then I was called to Santa Cruz on business, and my young friend said: "Well, I'd get either a dog or a cat and bring it home!" So I tried to get a dog.

The first try I made was up on High street. A certain young lady there owned five dogs, and I said with the directness for which I am rather celebrated: "Dear young lady, please give me one of your dogs." I shall never forget the startled, grieved expression in the great, luminous eyes she raised to mine, for she was just presenting, in the most gracious manner, a plate of cake to me. "Yes," she said, after a moment's hesitation, "oh, yes." But I knew she did not mean that kind of yes, and I did not blame her when later I saw a magnificent greyhound, a beautiful spaniel, another hound, a terrier, and some other dogs which I would not have parted with either, had they belonged to me. There was a possible Great Dane mentioned, and I said I'd take him, too, if I could get him.

Next day I was to go home; and walking up Pacific avenue, I saw a lovely spaniel lying on the sidewalk in front of a hardware store, just the kind of a dog I should have liked. I stood still awhile pretending to look at the pots and pans in the windows, but really looking at the dog. One of the number of gentlemen conversing in front of the store turned to go; but the dog did not follow him, nor did the other two pay any attention to the spaniel. "A stray dog," I said to myself, for I had read in the "Sentinel" that too many of them were running in the streets.

So I asked one of the gentlemen: "Is that your dog?" and he said "No." He did not know whose it was. "All right," I said, "I'll take him then," and I proceeded to gather up the little black creature at once. "Hold on," interposed the gentlemen; "some one in the store may own him," and sure enough, some one did own him, so this attempt at kidnapping was nipped in the bud.

It was getting on toward noon; my train would leave a little past one, and it was now a case of "get a dog; honestly, if may be, but get a dog." Calling on some friends-whose name perhaps I had better not mention-and making known my desire for the possession of a dog, I was told of one that could perhaps be-well, let us say -gotten. It was understood that he was to be brought to the train for me, and I trotted off quite happy.

Now, it so happened that to that train, that day, there came. shining legal lights, weighty editors, editor's wives with keen perceptions of the ri diculous, and literary ladies as famed. for sarcasm as for fine talents in satire. Finding myself amongst these people, I was naturally anxious to appear dignified and calm as a woman of my years ought to be. and I tried to talk rationally and look wise. I might have succeeded had I not suddenly discovered the approach of an unknown individual leading a diminutive dog by a line. "Oh, here's my dog!" I exclaimed, and I jumped up from my seat, ran through the crowded car, snatched up the dog and returned with the frantic animal struggling in my arms, just as the train started.

Such a shout of laughter went up to the roof of that car! Everybody wanted to see the dog; they all made fun of him, and me, too, I'm afraid; but they were all good-natured, and some one always telegraphed or telephoned to me every time the conductor hove in sight; and the dog regularly went into eclipse, at such time, under my big black coat. But Monkey, as everybody called the little brute on sight, after struggling desperately for a while, became perfectly tractable, and still as a mouse, when allowed to slip out of my lap to the floor of the car.

The crucial test of my courage came when we approached Wrights, and I knew I should have to carry the beast out in my arms or lose him. But I gathered up my courage and the "purp," struggled down the aisle toward the door, and making the best