John of the Woods

about was as wild as anything they had passed. But here, quite al

dals. A rope was tied about his waist. Gigi had sometimes seen men so dressed plodding along the highroad or begging from the townsfolk. If he thought about them at all, he believed them to be some rival sort of performers, l

or of the little hut. A great black raven hopped gravely about the old man's feet, now and then picking up a bug. Lying peacefully asleep in front of the hut door, like a yellow mat of fur, a fox was stretched. In and out among the rose-bushes of a tiny garden which was planted beneath the window of the hut, hopped several

n let the book fall from his hand, and sat staring. The animals leaped from their slumbers and scuttled away in every direction, some into the hut, some into the neighboring bushes, some melting as if

ainst a tree. Released from his burden, the dog bounded forward, and was soon leaping

e hast thou been so long, good dog? And what new pet hast thou brought for my colony?" He

s friends; who read, too, in a great black book! Gigi had heard of wicked wizards and sorcerers, and he believed that he saw one now. He turne

ted him and bore him into the little hut. The old man laid Gigi on a cot beside the window, and a

rstood. He drank and felt better. Then the old man asked

he was. The old man went swiftly to a little cupboard in the

the warm milk of my friend the doe, which I had just set aside, not expecting you. The

. When he had finished, the kind old hands brought water and bathed the tired body, bound up the bleeding hands

past two days. But strangest of all, though by far the pleasantest, was that picture which he had seen when he came out in