"A miracle!" exclaimed the Professor.
"A miracle!" cried Toney.
"A miracle!" shouted Tom.
The eyes of Moses widely dilated, and he gazed in intense wonder. Off went the bull with the image hanging on his horns, roaring and running around; while ever and anon the Blessed Virgin would emit an explosion which added an increase to his speed. Finally she fell to the ground, and was sacrilegiously trampled under hoof, and lay with her gaudy robes scorched, and smoking, and torn to tatters.
"What a shocking sight!" exclaimed Tom Seddon.
"Will nobody go to her rescue?" said Toney.
"Yonder comes her avenger!" said the Professor, as a man on foot advanced, with one hand brandishing a dart having a small streamer attached to it, and shaking a red flag with the other. The bull, indignant at the insult, came at him with a bound, when, nimbly leaping aside, he planted his missile in the flank of his foe, and the infuriated animal charged on another assailant with similar results.
Soon his sides were covered with little javelins, each having a gaudy pennon on its end waving in the wind. He fought with pluck and determination, but evidently at a disadvantage; for his antagonists, when hard pressed, would retreat behind a circular palisade of posts, whither he could not follow them. Making a charge on one of the buzzards, however, he tore off a wing before the clumsy bird could get out of the way. The disgusting fowl uttered a loud squall, such as was never heard from one of its species before.
"The poor fairy has lost one of his pinions," said Tom.
"He will not be able to soar away to his home in the Andes after he has dined," said Toney.