BERT SEES THINGS 103 
stones and pile them near our beds. Then just as 
we started to doze the first signals of the coming 
conflict would sound. From down the creek, from up 
the creek, from the slopes on either hand swarmed 
the vanguard of the hog battalions. Black hogs, 
white hogs, little and big, all sorts and conditions of 
hogs, swooped down in a vicious spirit of evil ca- 
maraderie upon our devoted camp. 
Then the battle would join. Stones and curses 
rained upon the invaders. <A perfect bedlam en- 
sued, the terrified cries of the hogs mingling with 
the shouts and execrations of our party and the fu- | 
rious barking of the dogs. kl 
For our dogs, be it said to their credit, did their 
part nobly. ‘‘Violet,’’ the bull-terrier, ‘‘Nico- 
demus,’’ the thoroughbred Airedale, and ‘‘Snip,’’ the 
most useful of the lot, who according to Brown, his 
master, was of the ‘‘just dog’’ strain, charged the 
hogs time and again. Each sortie had the same re- 
sult... The visitors would turn and run off as fast as 
they could, screaming and squealing until pursuit 
ceased. The dogs would then return, the fusillade 
of stones cease, and all would be as silent as death, 
for about half an hour. Then again from up the 
creek, from down the creek and from all round about 
sounded tentative, experimental grunts and gurgles 
and we knew that another attack was beginning to 
develop and end in the same manner as the first— 
and all the others. 
This nightly combat was- hard enough on all of 
