Alone and unaided, she had now to pierce a passage through the thicket, uncertain whither it might lead, and filled with apprehensions. But, in a few minutes, greatly to her satisfaction, her new friend re-appeared; wagging his tail, rubbing himself against her gown, and meeting and returning her caresses. Her project of obtaining a conductor was now recurring, when again an Haloo! followed by the whistling of two voices, called off her hope; and shewed her that her intended protector belonged to the young men whom she had been endeavouring to avoid. She knew not whether it were better, under the auspices of her new ally, to risk begging a direction from these youths, to some house or village; or still to seek her desolate way alone. She had time only to start, not to solve this doubt; the dog, again returning, as if unwilling to relinquish his new alliance, began to excite the curiosity of his masters; who, following, exclaimed, 'Dash a vound zomething, zure!' and presently, through the trees, she descried two wood-cutters. She was seen, also, by them; they scrambled faster on; and one of them said, 'Why t'be a girl!' 'Be it?' answered the other; 'why then I'll have a kiss.' 'Not a fore me, mon!' cried his companion, 'vor I did zee her virzt!' 'Belike you did,' the other replied; 'but I zpoke virzt; zo you mun come after!' Juliet now saw herself in a danger more dreadful than any to which either misfortune or accident had hitherto exposed her,--the danger of personal and brutal insult. She looked around vainly for succour or redress; the woods and the heavens were alone within view or within hearing. The first terrible moment of this alarm was an agony of affright, that made her believe herself a devoted victim to outrage: but the moment after, observing that the young men were beginning to combat for precedence, a sudden hope of escape revived her courage, and gave wings to her feet; and, defying every obstacle, she pushed on a passage, through the intricate thicket, almost with the swiftness that she might have crossed the smoothest plain, till she arrived at an open spot of ground. The fear of losing her now ended, though without deciding, the dispute; and the youths ran on together, mutually and loudly shouting familiar appeals, after the fugitive, upon their rights, with entreaties that she would stop. Juliet again felt her strength expiring; but where courage is the result of understanding, if its operation is less immediate than that which springs from physical bravery, it is not less certain. The despair, therefore, of saving herself by bodily exertion, presently gave rise to a mental effort, which instigated her to turn round upon her persecutors, and await and face them; with the same assumed firmness, though not with the offered caresses, with which she had just encountered her four-footed pursuer.