ilvered by the moonbeams, sway to and fro, like
the soft tremulous wavelets of a tropic sea; myriads of fire-flies
prinkling among the spikes, and emitting a gleam, as phosphorescent
_medusae_, make the resemblance complete.

The retreating horseman has no such comparison in his thoughts, nor any
time to contemplate Nature. The troubled expression in his eyes, tells
he is in no mood for it. His glance is not given to the grass, nor the
brilliant "lightning bugs," but to a dark belt discernible beyond,
apparently a tract of timber, similar to that he has just traversed.
More carefully scrutinised, it is seen to be rocks, not trees; in short
a continuous line of cliff, forming the boundary of the bottom-land.

He viewing it, well knows what it is, and intends proceeding on to it.
He only stays to take bearings for a particular place, at which he
evidently aims. His muttered words specify the point.

"The gulch must be to the right. I've gone up-river all the while.
Confound the crooked luck! It may throw me behind them going back; and
how am I to find my way over the big plain! If I get strayed there--Ha!
I see the pass now; yon sharp shoulder of rock--its there."

Once more setting his horse in motion, he makes for the point thus
identified. Not now in zig-zags, or slowly--as when working his way
through the timber--but in a straight tail-on-end gallop, fast as the
animal can go.

And now under the bright moonbeams it may be time to take a closer
survey of the hastening horseman. In garb he is Indian, from the
mocassins on his feet to the fillet of stained feathers surmounting his
head. But the colour of his skin contradicts the idea of his being an
aboriginal. His face shows white, but with some smut upon it, like that
of a chimney-sweep negligently cleansed. And his features are
Caucasian, not ill-favoured, except in their sinister expression; for
they are the features of Richard Darke.

Knowing it is he, it will be equally understood that the San Saba is the
stream whose sough is so dissonant in his ears, as also, why he is so
anxious to put a wide space between himself and its waters. On its bank
he has heard a name, and caught sight of him bearing it--the man of all
others he has most fear. The backwoodsman who tracked him in the
forests of Mississippi, now trailing him upon the prairies of Texas,
Simeon Woodley ever pursuing him! If in terror he has been retreating
through the trees, not less do