er--at all events, not upon its
trundle. Instinctively, we turned our eyes upward--not with any
superstitious belief that the fugitives had made a sudden ascent into
the air. But the idea had occurred to us, that they might have hidden
themselves in a tree, and drawn the barrow up into it. A single glance
was sufficient to satisfy us that this conjecture was erroneous. The
thin foliage of the cotton-woods offered no cover. A squirrel could
hardly have concealed itself among their branches.

"I've got it!" exclaimed the hunter, once more seeking along the
surface. "Hyar's thar tracks; tho' thar ain't no signs of the berra. I
see how they've blinded us. By gosh! thar a kupple o' cunnin' old
coons, whosomever they be."

"How have they managed it?"

"Tuk up the machine on thar shoulders, an' toted it thataway! See!
thar's thar own tracks! They've gone out hyar--atween these two trees."

"Right, comrade--that appears to be the way they've done it. Sure
enough there is the direction they have taken."

"Well! ef I wan't bothered wi' these hyar animals, I ked follow them
tracks easy enough. We'd soon kum upon the wheel agin, I reck'n: they
ain't a-goin' to travel fur, wi' a hump like thet on thar shoulders."

"No; it's not likely."

"Wal, then, capt'n, s'pose we leave our critters hyar, an' take arter
'em afut? We kin quarter the groun' a good bit ahead; an I guess we'll
eyther kum on them or thar berra afore long."

I agreed to this proposal; and, after securing our four quadrupeds to
trees, we started off into the depth of the woods. Only for a short
distance were we able to make out the footsteps of the men: for they had
chosen the dry sward to walk upon. In one place, where the path was
bare of grass, their tracks were distinctly outlined; and a minute
examination of them assured me of the correctness of my conjecture--that
we were trailing a brace of runaways from a military post. There was no
mistaking the print of the "regulation" shoe. Its shape was impressed
upon my memory as plainly as in the earth before my eyes; and it
required no quartermaster to recognise the low, ill-rounded heel and
flat pegged soles. I identified them at a glance; and saw, moreover,
that the feet of both the fugitives were encased in the same cheap
_chaussure_. Only in size did the tracks differ; and in this so widely,
that the smaller was little more than two-thirds the length of the
larger one! The latter was rema