"After this, the lady allowed her dog to play with the others as much as he liked. He was always well treated. But he did not have sense enough to keep in his own street One day he wandered off into another quarter, and he was instantly attacked. His dog friends heard the noise and rushed after him. When they got to him, he was surrounded on all sides by his enemies.
"It would have gone hard with him, if one brave friend had not seized him by the neck and rushed home with him. He did not stop till he reached the lady's house, where he dropped the terrier on the door-step.
"Even then, he and his comrades did not go away. There they waited till the owner appeared, when they tried to explain, as well as poor doggies can, what had happened."
"What noble fellows they were," said Osman, when his mother had finished the story. "I shall love them more than ever." Then the little boy went on to tell of the family of puppies Selim had discovered.
"I will go to see them early to-morrow morning, and will carry some food to the mother," he said. "I love puppies. They are beautiful little things, and their hair is as soft as silk."
Osman loved pets as much as any other boy in the wide world, and he was always ready to take a family of puppies into his heart. His parents taught him, however, that it was not good to handle them. "The dog is an unclean animal," said the boy's father. "Be kind to him and love him, but touch him as little as possible."
CHAPTER IV.
THE PICNIC