e thought it was better to give a false warning than withhold a true
one; he ran to his horse, jumped on him, and spurred away.

His horse was fast and powerful, and carried him in three minutes back
to Emden's farm. The farmer had gone to bed. Ransome knocked him up, and
told him he feared the dam was going; then galloped on to Hatfield Mill.
Here he found the miller and his family all gathered outside, ready for
a start; one workman had run down from the reservoir.

"The embankment is not safe."

"So I hear. I'll take care of my flour and my folk. The mill will take
care of itself." And he pointed with pride to the solid structure and
granite pillars.

Ransome galloped on, shouting as he went.

The shout was taken up ahead, and he heard a voice crying in the night,
"IT'S COMING! IT'S COMING!" This weird cry, which, perhaps, his own
galloping and shouting had excited, seemed like an independent warning,
and thrilled him to the bone. He galloped through Hatfield, shouting,
"Save yourselves! Save yourselves!" and the people poured out, and ran
for high ground, shrieking wildly; looking back, he saw the hill dotted
with what he took for sheep at first, but it was the folk in their
night-clothes.

He galloped on to Damflask, still shouting as he went.

At the edge of the hamlet, he found a cottage with no light in it; he
dismounted and thundered at the door: "Escape for your lives! for your
lives!"

A man called Hillsbro' Harry opened the window.

"The embankrncnt is going. Fly for your lives!"

"Nay," said the man, coolly, "Ouseley dam will brust noane this week,"
and turned to go to bed again.

He found Joseph Galton and another man carrying Mrs. Galton and her
new-born child away in a blanket. This poor woman, who had sent her five
children away on the faith of a dream, was now objecting, in a faint
voice, to be saved herself from evident danger. "Oh, dear, dear! you
might as well let me go down with the flood as kill me with taking me
away."

Such was the sapient discourse of Mrs. Galton, who, half an hour ago,
had been supernaturally wise and prudent. Go to, wise mother and silly
woman; men will love thee none the less for the inequalities of thine
intellect; and honest Joe will save thy life, and heed thy twaddle no
more than the bleating of a lamb.

Ransome had not left the Galtons many yards behind him, when there was a
sharp explosion heard up in the hills.

Ransome pulled up and said aloud, "It