y dragoon in the parlor to the window.

He threw his body out of the building, and with dreadful imprecations
endeavored by threats and appearance to frighten the marauders from
their prey. The moment was enticing. Three hundred of his comrades
were within a mile of the cottage; unridden horses were running at
large in every direction, and Henry Wharton seized the unconscious
sentinel by his legs and threw him headlong into the lawn. Caesar
vanished from the room, and drew a bolt of the outer door.

Recovering his feet, the sentinel turned his fury for a moment on his
prisoner. To scale the window in the face of such an enemy, was,
however, impossible, and on trial he found the main entrance barred.

His comrade now called loudly upon him for aid, and forgetting
everything else, the discomfited trooper rushed to his assistance. One
horse was instantly liberated, but the other was already fastened to
the saddle of a Cow-Boy, and the four retired behind the building,
cutting furiously at each other with their sabres, and making the air
resound with their imprecations. Caesar threw the outer door open, and
pointing to the remaining horse, that was quietly biting the faded
herbage of the lawn, he exclaimed:

"Run, now, run--Massa Harry, run!"

"Yes," cried the youth, as he vaulted into the saddle, "now indeed, my
honest fellow, is the time to run."

When the fortune of the day was decided, and the time arrived for the
burial of the dead, two Cow-Boys and a Virginian were found in the
rear of the Locusts, to be included in the number.

Wharton's horse was of the best Virginian blood, and carried him with
the swiftness of the wind along the valley; and the heart of the youth
was already beating tumultuously with pleasure of his deliverance,
when a well-known voice reached his startled ear, crying loudly:

"Bravely done, captain! Don't spare the whip, and turn to your left
before you cross the brook."

Wharton turned his head in surprise, and saw, sitting on the point of
a jutting rock that commanded a bird's-eye view of the valley, his
former guide, Harvey Birch. The English captain took the advice of
this mysterious being, and finding a good road which led to the
highway that intersected the valley, turned down its direction, and
was soon opposite to his friends. The next minute he crossed the
bridge, and stopped his charger before his old acquaintance, Colonel
Wellmere.

"Captain Wharton!" exclaimed the astonish