wer which otherwise would be wasted in air. His superiority of
character was immediately manifest--his suggestions were adopted without
dissent; and, in a few moments the two troopers, accompanied by the
jailer, were in pursuit upon the very road taken by the fugitives.

Rivers, in the meanwhile, though excessively anxious about the result of
the pursuit, was yet too sensible of his own risk to remain much longer
in the village. Annoyed not a little by the apprehended loss of that
revenge which he had described as so delicious in contemplation to his
mind, he could not venture to linger where he was, at a time of such
general excitement and activity. With a prudent caution, therefore, more
the result of an obvious necessity than of any accustomed habit of his
life, he withdrew himself as soon as possible from the crowd, at the
moment when Pippin--who never lost a good opportunity--had mounted upon
a stump in order to address them. Breaking away just as the lawyer was
swelling with some old truism, and perhaps no truth, about the rights of
man and so forth, he mounted his horse, which he had concealed in the
neighborhood, and rode off to the solitude and the shelter of his den.

There was one thing that troubled his mind along with its other
troubles, and that was to find out who were the active parties in the
escape of Colleton. In all this time, he had not for a moment suspected
Munro of connection with the affair--he had too much overrated his own
influence with the landlord to permit of a thought in his mind
detrimental to his conscious superiority. He had no clue, the guidance
of which might bring him to the trail; for the jailer, conscious of his
own irregularity, was cautious enough in suppressing everything like a
detail of the particular circumstances attending the escape; contenting
himself, simply, with representing himself as having been knocked down
by some persons unknown, and rifled of the keys while lying insensible.

Rivers could only think of the pedler, and yet, such was his habitual
contempt for that person, that he dismissed the thought the moment it
came into his mind. Troubled thus in spirit, and filled with a thousand
conflicting notions, he had almost reached the rocks, when he was
surprised to perceive, on a sudden, close at his elbow, the dwarfish
figure of our old friend Chub Williams. Without exhibiting the slightest
show of apprehension, the urchin resolutely continued his course along
with