University of Virginia Library

4. CHAPTER IV.

Before reaching the road the sturdy woodman became
yet more cautious, and, stealing from cover to
cover, thus eluded any eye that might be approaching
upon it. He gained the cover of a little hedge, formed
of the tallow-bush and myrtle, and crouched cautiously
and silently out of sight, as he perceived, from the short,
quick cry of the cur, that he was advancing rapidly.
He had scarcely done so, and arranged an aperture in
the copse through which he might observe the road,
when he beheld the cause of the uproar which the dog
was making. Leaping in irregular bounds, and evidently
nearly exhausted, a frightened rabbit came down the
trace, inclining from the opposite and open ground of
pine forest, to the close bushes in which he was himself
concealed.

“Poor Bon,” exclaimed the woodman, “it's a bad
chance for her this time. I only hope she won't pop
into this quarter, or it will be a bad chance for some of
her friends.”

The muttered apprehensions of the woodman were
realized. His eye had scarcely noted the pursuing dog,
which emerged from the wood closely upon the rabbit's
heels, when the poor thing rushed to the very shelter in
which he stood, and, darting between his legs, was there
secured by their involuntary pressure together. He
stooped to the earth, and took up the trembling animal,
which lay quivering in his grasp, preferring, by the natural
prompting of its instinct, to trust the humanity of
man rather than the well-known nature of the enemy
which had pursued it.

“Poor Bonny,” said the woodman, soothingly, as he
caressed it. “Poor Bon—you couldn't help it, Bonny
—you were too mighty frightened to know the mischief
you're a-doing. Ten to one you've got us into a hobble,
now; but there's nothing to be done but to see it out.”

The dog by this time rushed into the brush, and recoiled
instantly as he beheld the stranger. The quick,
rapid cry with which he had pursued the rabbit, was exchanged
for the protracted bark with which he precedes
his assault upon the man. His white teeth were displayed,
and, as if conscious of approaching support, he
advanced boldly enough to the attack. The woodman
grew a little angry, and lifting his rifle in one hand, while
maintaining the terrified but quiet rabbit in the other, he
made an exhibition of it which prompted the cur to give
back. It was then that, through the bushes, he saw a
person approaching along the road whom he readily
took to be the owner of the dog. He dropped his rifle
instantly, which he suffered to rest, out of sight, against
a tree which stood behind him; and, hallooing to the
new-comer, he advanced without hesitation from his
place of concealment into the road.

Blonay—for it was he—drew up his tacky, and the
rifle which he carried across the saddle, in his hand, was
grasped firmly, and, at the first moment, was partially
uplifted; but, seeing that the stranger was unarmed, he
released his hold, and saluted him with an appearance of
as much good-humour as he could possibly put on.
Thumbscrew advanced to him with the trembling rabbit,
which he made the subject of his first address.

“How are you, stranger? I reckon this is some of
your property that I've got here—seeing as how your
dog started it. I cotched it 'twixt my legs—the poor
thing was so scared, it didn't know—not it—that 'twas
going out of the frying-pan into the fire. It's your'n
now; though, dang it, stranger, if so be you don't want
it much, I'd rether now you'd tell me to put it down in
the bush and let it run, while you make your dog hold
in. It's so scared, you see, and it's a pity to hurt any
thing in natur when you see it scared.”

He patted the feeble and trembling animal encouragingly
as he spoke, and Blonay was surprised that so
large a man should be so gently inclined. He himself
cared little, at any time, about the feelings and the fears
of yet larger objects. His reply to the application for
mercy was favourable, however.

“Well, if you choose, my friend, you can let it go. I
don't want it. The dog only started it for his own fun,
seeing that it's the nature of the beast. Here, Hitch'em,
Hitch'em! lie down, nigger—and shut up. You can let
her go now, my friend.”

Blonay quieted his dog, and Thumbscrew took his
way into cover, watched his moment, and, with a parting
pat upon its back, and a cheering “hurrah Bon, run for
it with your best legs,” dismissed the little captive, once
more in safety, to its forest habitations. He then returned
to the spot where Blonay remained in waiting, and,
in his blunt, good-humoured way, at once proceeded to
commence a conversation with him, after the manner of
the country, with a direct question.

“Well, now, stranger, you've been travelling a bit—
can you tell me, now, if you've seed anywhere in your
travels a man or boy that looks very much like a thief,
riding upon a fine dark-bay nag, that looks like he was
stolen?”

“No, that I haven't, friend—I'm much obliged to you,
but I haven't seen any,” was the reply of Blonay.

“Well, you needn't be obliged to me, stranger, seeing
it's no sarvice to you, the question I ax'd you. But
if it aint axing you too much, I should like to know
which road you come.”

“Well, to say truth, now, my friend, I don't know the
name it goes by—it's a main bad road, you see.”

“I ax, you see, because, when you tells me you aint
seed the nag and them that's riding him on the road you
come, it's a clear chance they've gone t'other. So, now,
if you'll only but say which road you tuk, I'll take the
contrary.”

The reasoning was so just, and the air of simplicity
so complete, which the inquirer had put on, that Blonay
saw no necessity for keeping concealed so unimportant
a matter as the mere route which he had been travelling;
so, without any farther scruple, he gave the required
information.

“Well, then, I reckon, stranger, you're all the way
from the big city, clear down to the salt seas. There's
a power of people there now, aint there?”

“I aint from Charleston,” coldly replied the Half-Breed.

“Oh, you aint—but, do tell—you hear'd about a man
that was hung at Dorchester—reckon you seed it?”

“He worn't hung—he got off.”

“What! they pardoned him—and so many people as
was guine to see him dance upon nothing? What a
disappointment! I was a-guine down myself, but, you
see, I lost my critter, and so I couldn't; and now I'm
glad I didn't, if so be, as you say, he worn't hung.”

“No, he worn't hung—there was a fight, and he got
away. But this is only what they tell me; I don't know
myself.”

“Who tell'd you?”

“The people.”

“What, them that seed it? Perhaps them that did it
—eh?”

This was pushing the matter quite too far, and Blonay
began to be uneasy under so leading a question.
He replied quickly, after the evasive manner which was
adopted between them,

“No! I don't know, they told me they heard it, and
I didn't ax much about it, for it worn't my business, you
see.”

“Oh! that's right,—everybody to his own business,
says I; and, where people's a-fighting, clean hands and
long distance is always best for a poor man and a stranger.
They gits a-fighting every now and then in these
here parts, and they do say they're a mustering now
above, the sodgers.”

“What soldiers?” demanded Blonay, with an air of
interest.

“Eh! what sodgers?—them that carries guns and
swords, and shoots people, to be sure—them's sodgers,
aint they?”

“Yes! but have they got on uniforms, or is it only
them that carries rifle, or a knife, or perhaps a rusty
sword, or a hatchet. Some soldiers, you know, has fine
boots and shoes, with shining buttons, and high caps and
feathers; and some haint got shoes, and hardly breeches.”

Blonay had become the examiner, and had begun
with a leading question also. He had fairly described
the British and tory troops in his enumeration of the one,
and the rebels, or whigs, in the description of the latter
class. The former were usually well provided with
arms, ammunition, and every necessary warlike equipment;—the
whigs were simply riflemen, half the time

without powder and lead, and, during the greater part
of the war, without necessary clothing. To tell Blonay
which of these two classes was in the neighbourhood,
was no part of Thumbscrew's policy; and his
reply, though unsatisfactory, was yet given with the most
off-handed simplicity.

“They're all the same to me, stranger, breeches or
no breeches, boots or no boots, high caps and feathers,
or a ragged steeple like mine—they're all the same to
me. A sodger's a sodger—any man that can put a bullet
into my gizzard, or cut me a slash over my cheek,
up and down, without any marcy for my jaw-bone—he's
a sodger for me, and I gits out of his way mighty soon
now when I hear of his coming. It's a bad business
that, stranger, and I hope you don't deal in it. I say I
hope so, for I don't like to see a man I may say I know,
chopped up and down, and bored through his head, or
his belly, without any axing, and perhaps onbeknown to
him.”

No interest could be, seemingly, so earnest, as that
which Thumbscrew manifested, as he thus expressed
his anxiety on the score of Goggle's connexion with
the military. He put his hand warmly, as he spoke,
upon the neck of the little tacky which the other bestrode
—a movement which the rider did not seem very greatly
to approve, as he contrived, in the next moment, by a
sudden jerk, to wheel the animal away from the grasp
of the stranger, and to present himself once more in
front of him. Thumbscrew did not appear to charge
the movement so much upon the rider as the horse.

“Well, now, stranger, your nag is mighty skittish.
It's a stout pony that, and smells, for all the world, as
if it had fed on cane-tops and salt-marsh all its life.
Talking about horses, now, I've hear'd say that they
were getting mighty scarce down in your parts, where
the troops harry them with hard riding. Some say that
they were buying and stealing all they could, to bring

troops up into this quarter. You aint hear'd any say
about it, I reckon?”

The inquiry was adroitly insinuated, but Blonay was
not to be caught, even had he been in possession of the
desired information. He availed himself of the question,
however, to suggest another, by which, had his
companion been less guarded, he might have discovered
to which party he belonged.

“What troops?” he asked, carelessly.

“Why, them that fights, to be sure. Troops, if I'm
rightly told, is them men that rides on horseback, and
fights with swords and pistols, and the big cannon.”

“Yes, troopers,” said Blonay, tired, seemingly, of
putting questions so unprofitably answered.

“Ay—troopers, is it?—I always called them troops
But you aint telled me if they're coming in these parts.
You aint seed any on the road, I reckon?—for you aint
hurt, that I can see. But, maybe you out-travelled 'em
—they shot at you, though?”

The volubility of Thumbscrew carried him so rapidly
on in his assumptions, that it was with difficulty Blonay
kept himself sufficiently reserved in his communications.
He was at some pains, however, to assure him that he
had neither seen any troops, nor been pursued, nor shot
at by them. That his whole journey hitherto had been
unmarked by any other adventure of more importance
than the catching of the single rabbit, in which Thumbscrew
had himself so largely assisted. This reference
drew the attention of Thumbscrew to the ragged and
mean-looking cur that followed the stranger. He admired
him exceedingly, and, at length, proceeded to ask
—“Won't you trade him, now, stranger? I want a hunting-dog
mightily.”

Blonay declined, and was so pleased and satisfied
with the simplicity of his new acquaintance, that he ventured
to ask some direct questions, taking care, however
that none of them should convey any committal of his

sentiments. He stated, for himself, that he was on his
way to Black river and the Santee—that he was looking
after a person who was indebted to him—that he was a
peaceable man, and wanted to get on without fighting,
and he was therefore desirous of avoiding all combatants.
In order to do this, he would like to know where
Gainey's men were (tories), and Marion's men—if they
were likely to lie in his way by pursuing such and such
routes, all of which he named, and seemed to know,
and how he should best avoid them. In making these
inquiries, Blonay had well adopted the manner of one
solicitous for peace, and only desirous of getting to the
end of his journey without difficulty or adventure. In
referring to the different leaders of the two parties in that
section of country, he took especial care, at the same
time, to utter no word, and exhibit no look or gesture,
which could convey the slightest feeling of partiality or
preference, on his part, for either; and all that Thumbscrew
could conjecture from the inquiry, supposing that
the traveller was disguising the truth, was, that, so far
from his wishing to avoid all of these parties, by obtaining
a knowledge of their lurking-places, he was rather
in search of one or the other of them. His scrutiny
failed utterly when he strove to find out which. He did
not long delay to answer these inquiries, which he did in
the unsatisfactory fashion of all the rest.

“Well, now, stranger, you ax a great deal more than I
have to answer. These here people that you talk about,
I hear, every day, something or other said of them, but
nothing very good, now, either way. It's now one, and
now another of them that shoots the poor folk's cattle,
and maybe shoots them too, and there's no help for it.
Sometimes Guiney's people run over the country, burning
and plundering—then Marion's men comes after,
burning and plundering what's left. So that, between
the two, honest, quiet, good-natured sort of people, like
you and me, stranger—we get the worst of it, and must

cut strap and take the brush, rather than lose life with
property. It's a sad time, now, stranger, I tell you.”

“But you aint heard of either of 'em in these parts
lately, have you?” inquired Blonay.

“Dang it, stranger, they're here, there, and everywhere:
they're never long missing from any one place,
and—dang my buttons! I think I hear some of them
coming now.”

Thumbscrew turned as he spoke, and appeared to listen.
Sounds, as of horses' feet, were certainly approaching,
and perceptible to Blonay not less than to his dog.
With the confirmation of his conjecture, the woodman
turned quickly to the forest cover, and, shaking his head,
cried to his companion, as he bounded into its depths—

“Look to yourself, stranger, for, as sure as a gun,
some of them sodgers is a-coming. They'll shoot you
through the body, and chop you into short meat, if you
don't cut for it.”

He disappeared on the instant, but not in flight. His
purpose was to mislead Blonay, and it was sufficient for
this that he simply removed himself from sight. Keeping
the edge of the forest, as close to the road as he
well might, to avoid discovery from it, he now chose
himself a station from which he might observe the approaching
horsemen, and, at the same time, remain in
safety. This done, he awaited patiently their approach.
His late companion, in the meanwhile, whose policy was
a like caution, quickly followed the suggestion and
example of the woodman, and sank into the forest immediately
opposite that which the latter had chosen for
his shelter. Here he imbowered himself in the woods
sufficiently far for concealment, and, hiding his horse,
and placing his dog in watch over him, he advanced on
foot within a stone's cast from the road, to a spot commanding
a good view of every thing upon it. Here, in
deep silence, he also stood—a range of trees between
his person and that of the approaching horsemen, and

his form more immediately covered by the huge body of
a pine, from behind which he occasionally looked forth
in scrutinizing watchfulness.