But she told me to keep back, and ran on herself.
The boys were throwing water on the dogs, and pulling their tails, and hurling stones at them, but they could not separate them.

Their heads seemed locked together, and they went back and forth over the stones, the boys crowding around them, shouting, and beating, and kicking at them.
"Stand back, boys," said Miss Laura; "I'll stop them." She pulled a little parcel from her purse, bent over the dogs, scattered a powder on their noses, and the next instant the dogs were yards apart, nearly sneezing their heads off.
"I say, Missis, what did you do?
What's that stuff?
Whew, it's pepper!" the boys exclaimed.
Miss Laura sat down on a flat rock, and looked at them with a very pale face.

"Oh, boys," she said, "why did you make those dogs fight?
It is so cruel.

They were playing happily till you set them on each other.

Just see how they have torn their handsome coats, and how the blood is dripping from them." "'Taint my fault," said one of the lads, sullenly.