Joshua gazed at the animal in silence, and sucked a straw which he had in his mouth reflectively. Tim looked anxiously up into his face. Would he take a fancy to him? The landlord had now drawn near, and also an inquisitive ostler. The old chestnut-seller ceased to rock herself to and fro, and turned her head towards the group, so that the dog, so lonely a few minutes ago, had suddenly become a centre of interest. He seemed to wonder at this, but he scarcely moved his eyes, with a mute appeal in them, from his first friend, Tim. At last, after what seemed an immense silence, Joshua spoke. "He ain't a beauty--not to look at," he said. This might have sounded discouraging to anyone who did not know Joshua, but it was rather the reverse to Tim. "He'd be werry useful in the cart," he suggested, taking care not to appear too anxious. But now the landlord, feeling it time to offer his opinion, broke into the discussion. "There's no doubt, as the boy says, that you'd find a dog useful, but I wouldn't have a brute of a cur like that, if I was you. Now I could give you as pretty a pup to bring up to the business as you could wish to see. A real game un. Death to anything reasonable he'd be in a year's time. Them nasty mongrels is never no good." Now this adverse opinion was, strange to say, sufficient to make up Joshua's mind in the dog's favour; he always took a contrary view of things to the landlord on principle, because it encouraged conversation, and this habit was so strong that he at once began to see the special advantages of a mongrel. "He's a werry faithful creetur, is a mongrel, if he's properly trained," he said slowly and solemnly; "and as to _game_, where's the game he'd find in a carrier's cart? You can bring him along, mate." Leaving the landlord in a temporarily crushed condition, he walked off to his horses, which stamped impatiently at all this delay. The dog suffered Tim to take him in his arms without any resistance, though he winced a little as if in pain, and the cart presently drove away from the small knot of interested spectators gathered round the inn door. Then, gently examining his new comrade, the boy found that one of his hind-legs was injured, so that he could not put it to the ground, and moaned when it was touched, though he licked Tim's hand immediately afterwards in apology. "But I don't think it's broke," said the boy encouragingly; "and when we get home I'll bathe it and tie it up, and I dessay I can find yer a bit o' supper." Soothed perhaps by this prospect, and evidently feeling a sense of comfort and protection, the dog stretched out his thin, weary limbs, and soon, sharing the warm shelter of Tim's horse-cloth, slept profoundly. And thus the new friends made their first journey together. STORY TWO, CHAPTER 2. FAITHFUL MOSES--A SHORT STORY--(CONTD).