rivate; they certainly did not to his
directions, which led me two miles astray, before I had ridden twice
that distance; no trifling error, when you had to struggle back over
steep, broken ground, through drifts fully girth deep.

However, as evening closed in, I "made" Accident--the point where I
ought to have found Shipley. He was a very good guide--when you caught
him--but such a perfect _ignis fatuus_, when once out of sight, that I
was not at all surprised at hearing he had gone on, the night before, to
a farm-house--more safe and secluded, certainly--about sixteen miles
off. My informant offered to pilot me thither so soon as it should be
thoroughly dark. This offer I accepted at once, only hoping that Falcon
would, like myself, consider it "all in the day's work."

I shall never forget my halt at Accident, if only on account of the
martyrdom I endured at the hands of some small, pale boys, children of
the house wherein I abode. I had just settled myself to smoke a
meditative pipe before supper, when they came in, with a formidable air
of business about all the three; they drew up a little bench, exactly
opposite to my rocking-chair, fixing themselves, and me, into a
deliberate stare. Every now and then the spokes-boy of the party--he was
the oldest, evidently, but his face was smaller and whiter, and his eyes
were more like little black beads than those of either of his
brethren--would fire off a point-blank pistol-shot of a question; when
this was answered or evaded, they resumed their steady stare. I was
lapsing rapidly into a helpless imbecility under the horrible
fascination, when their mother summoned me to supper; they vanished
then, with a derisive chuckle, to which they were certainly entitled:
for they had utterly discomfited the stranger within their gates.

One more long night-ride over steep, broken forest-ground--enlivened by
certain ultra-marine reminiscences of my guide, who had been a sort of
land-buccaneer in California--brought us to the farm, far in the bosom
of the hills, where I found Shipley, buried in a deep sleep. The sole
intelligence I heard that night related to the roan: the enfeebled
constitution of that unlucky animal had given way under rough travel and
wild weather; he was reported to be dying; hearing which, I could
scarcely deny him great good sense, however I might lament his lack of
endurance.

"The sooner it's over, the sooner to sleep," applies, of course, to
horses as w