r devil to the skin, tickled my fancy
so exceedingly, that the sound of his horse's hoofs had hardly died
away, when I burst into an almost interminable fit of laughter. "First
right, then left--look out for the big walnut-tree, and don't break your
neck over the crags!" repeated I, in a tone between merriment and
despair. Richards, however, saw nothing to laugh at.

"The devil take the Yankee!" cried he. "May I be hanged if I know what
you find so amusing in all this!"

"And hang me if I know how you manage to look so grave!" was my answer.

"How could we possibly have missed the ferry?" cried Richards; "and,
what is still more stupid, to come back instead of going forward!"

"Not very astonishing," replied I, "considering the multitude of
by-roads and cross-roads, and waggon-tracks and cattle-paths, and the
swamp into the bargain. It is quite impossible to see which way the
river runs. And then you have been sleeping all the afternoon, and I had
to find the way by myself."

"And you found it after an extraordinary fashion--retracing your own
steps," said Richards in a vexed tone. "It is really too stupid."

"Very stupid," said I--"to sleep."

As may be seen, we were on the verge of a quarrel; but we were old and
sincere friends, and stopped in time. The discussion was dropped. The
fact was, that our mistake was by no means a very surprising one. The
country in which we were, seemed made on purpose to lose one's-self in.
The road winds along at some distance from the river, frequently out of
sight of it; the shore is uneven, covered with crags and hillocks;
nothing like a landmark to be seen, or a mountain to guide one's-self
by, except occasionally, when one gets a peep at the Appalachians rising
out of the blue distance. The fog, however, had hidden them from us, and
that just at the time when we most wanted them as guides. We found
ourselves in a long low clearing--a sort of bottom, as they call it in
that country--which was laid out in sugar-fields, and through which
there ran nearly as many cart-roads as there were owners to the land.
The morning had been bright and beautiful; but, towards noon, a grey
mist had begun to rise in the south-western corner of the horizon, and
had gone on, thickening and advancing, till it spread like a pall over
the Tennessee. With a grey wall of fog on one side, and the swamp,
intersected with a hundred cross-paths, on the other, we had gone on for
about a mile; until it got s