no Hawk could elude him,
for this was a Falcon. Turn back now, O Homer, and save yourself; go
round the dangerous hills. Did he turn? Not a whit! for this was
Arnaux. Home! home! home! was his only thought. To meet the danger, he
merely added to his speed; and the Peregrine stooped; stooped at
what?--a flashing of color, a twinkling of whiteness--and went back
empty. While Arnaux cleft the air of the valley as a stone from a
sling, to be lost--a white-winged bird--a spot with flashing halo--and,
quickly, a speck in the offing. On down the dear valley of Hudson, the
well-known highway; for two years he had not seen it! Now he dropped
low as the noon breeze came north and ruffled the river below him.
Home! home! home! and the towers of a city are coming in view! Home!
home! past the great spider-bridge of Poughkeepsie, skimming, skirting
the river-banks. Low now by the bank as the wind arose. Low, alas! too
low!

What fiend was it tempted a gunner in June to lurk on that hill by the
margin? what devil directed his gaze to the twinkling of white that
came from the blue to the northward? Oh, Arnaux, Arnaux, skimming low,
forget not the gunner of old! Too low, too low you are clearing that
hill. Too low--too late! Flash--bang! and the death-hail has reached
him; reached, maimed, but not downed him. Out of the flashing pinions
broken feathers printed with records went fluttering earthward. The
"naught" of his sea record was gone. Not two hundred and ten, but
twenty-one miles it now read. Oh, shameful pillage! A dark stain
appeared on his bosom, but Arnaux kept on. Home, home, homeward bound.
The danger was past in an instant. Home, homeward he steered straight
as before, but the wonderful speed was diminished; not a mile a minute
now; and the wind made undue sounds in his tattered pinions. The stain
in his breast told of broken force; but on, straight on, he flew. Home,
home was in sight, and the pain in his breast was forgotten. The tall
towers of the city were in clear view of his far-seeing eye as he
skimmed by the high cliffs of Jersey. On, on--the pinion might flag,
the eye might darken, but the home-love was stronger and stronger.

Under the tall Palisades, to be screened from the wind, he passed, over
the sparkling water, over the trees, under the Peregrines' eyrie, under
the pirates' castle where the great grim Peregrines sat; peering like
black-masked highwaymen they marked the on-coming Pigeon. Arnaux knew
them