In the opening scene of Arthur Hughes’s The Rescue triptych, a young child kneels alone in a sun-dappled glade, clasping his hands in quiet reverie. Nature surrounds him—birds, squirrels, and tangled roots—but danger coils silently at his feet in the form of a green dragon, nearly camouflaged by the undergrowth. This Pre-Raphaelite composition heightens tension through contrast: innocence unaware of its peril. The forest, radiant and alive, becomes a stage for moral allegory, where purity is threatened but not yet lost. Hughes’s fusion of fairy tale and moral fable creates a scene of quiet suspense and mythic beauty.