"Jack, Jack, Jack!"

"I'm afraid some boys have got your little dog," said Lucian. "They've
killed him. You'd better go back home."

He went on, walking as fast as he could in his endeavor to get beyond the
noise of the child's crying. It distressed him, and he wished to think of
other things. He stamped his foot angrily on the ground as he recalled
the annoyances of the afternoon, and longed for some hermitage on the
mountains, far above the stench and the sound of humanity.

A little farther, and he came to Croeswen, where the road branched off to
right and left. There was a triangular plot of grass between the two
roads; there the cross had once stood, "the goodly and famous roode" of
the old local chronicle. The words echoed in Lucian's ears as he went by
on the right hand. "There were five steps that did go up to the first
pace, and seven steps to the second pace, all of clene hewn ashler. And
all above it was most curiously and gloriously wrought with thorowgh
carved work; in the highest place was the Holy Roode with Christ upon the
Cross having Marie on the one syde and John on the other. And
below were six splendent and glisteringe archaungels tha bore up the
roode, and beneath them in their stories were the most fair and noble
images of the xii Apostles and of divers other Saints and Martirs. And
in the lowest storie there was a marvelous imagerie of divers Beasts,
such as oxen and horses and swine, and little dogs and peacocks, all done
in the finest and most curious wise, so that they all seemed as they were
caught in a Wood of Thorns, the which is their torment of this life. And
here once in the year was a marvelous solemn service, when the parson of
Caermaen came out with the singers and all the people, singing the psalm
_Benedicite omnia opera_ as they passed along the road in their