'Over, Nep; over again.'

And again I was crouching down in my place of concealment on the field side.

The oftener the bull was baffled the greater became his rage. And, alas! each time that he leaped the wall he came nearer and nearer to us. I felt my blood growing cold within me. How could I protect my mistress? how save myself? Should I fly at the savage beast, and closing with him, risk my life in the deadly struggle? Surely this would be better than to die ignobly in the ditch. Another moment and I should have made the venture, when I heard my mistress's decided word of command

There was no choice, then, for me. If I could not save her in my life, I could at least show her obedience in my death.

And now I almost seemed to feel the fiery breath of the bull upon my forehead. The last struggle is to come on the field side, for that at least I am thankful, for my mistress will be safe.

The bull springs again. My fate is sealed. I am now within reach of his deadly horns. To lie still and look was more than I could bear. I closed my eyes, and with one deep sigh I resigned myself to my fate, when lo! just as I

was expecting to feel the agony of his horns entering my side, I hear shouts of men's voices. The bull stops irresolute.

Nep, dear Nep, over!' says my mistress; and as with a spring I clear the wall, and stand by her side, men run up with pitchforks to our assistance, and just as destruction seemed inevitable, we know that we are saved.

Calm and self-possessed in the hour of danger, my mistress was quite overcome in the moment of assured safety; and sitting down on a bank by the roadside, she put her arm round my neck, and leaning over me, I felt a tear drop upon my forehead, whilst I heard low murmured words of thankfulness coming fervently from her lips.

I too felt very thankful, and if I did not express my gratitude so eloquently as my mistress did, at least I tried to show it by keeping quite still and silent by her side, and then by walking home as close to her as possible, never so much as indulging in one run, nor treating myself to one bound or frisk.

CHAPTER V.

NSEPARABLE Companions as were my mistress and myself, it is easy to imagine how devoted became my affection for her. I was never happy out of her sight, and her very presence

seemed to give a new tone to my character, raising and ennobling it, till I was tempted to think myself the very perfect being which kind old Jane was so apt to tell me that I was.

And yet, all the time that I was thus hugging myself in my self-conceit, there was lurking within me the seed of such a dark and evil passion, that had it not been timely checked, it might have turned all that was noble within me into that which was most base and mean, so strangely close are good and evil blended in

our nature.

A mere accident taught me to know myself. My mistress and I were returning from one