And the fleet-footed ostrich over the waste Speeds like a horseman who travels in haste; For she hies away to the home of her rest, Where she and her mate have scooped their nest, Far hid from the pitiless plunderer's view, Afar in the desert I love to ride Where the white man's foot hath never passed, And the quivered Coranna or Bechuan Which the snake and the lizard inhabit alone, With the twilight but from the old hollow stone, Where grass nor herb nor shrub takes root, But the barren earth and the burning sky, And here, while the night-winds round me sigh And the stars burn bright in the midnight sky THE CAPTURE. N the morning that succeeded | practised soldier whom frequent frays have taught wisdom, he resolved to reconnoitre before he advanced upon a post that might be in possession of an enemy. He therefore dismounted, fastened his horse in a fencecorner, where a field of corn concealed him from notice, and then stealthily crept forward until he came immediately behind one of the outhouses. From this position he was enabled to satisfy himself that no danger was to be apprehended from his visit. He accordingly approached and entered the dwelling, where he soon found himself in the presence of its mistress. the night in which Horseshoe Robinson arrived at Musgrove's the stout sergeant might have been seen, about eight o'clock, leaving the main road from Ninety-Six, at the the point where that leading to David Ramsay's separated from it, and cautiously urging his way into the deep forest by the more private path into which he had entered. The knowledge that Innis was encamped along the Ennoree, within a short distance of the mill, had compelled him to make an extensive circuit to reach Ramsay's dwelling, whither he was now bent, and he had experienced considerable delay in his morning journey by finding himself frequently in the neighborhood of small foraging-parties of Tories, whose motions he was obliged to watch for fear of an encounter. He had once already been compelled to use his horse's heels in what he called "fair flight," and once to ensconce himself a full half hour under cover of the thicket afforded him by a swamp. He now, therefore, according to his own phrase, "dived into the "I am alone," said Robinson. little road that scrambled down through the little wettish, mistress," he added as he took woods toward Ramsay's with all his eyes off his hat and shook the water from it; "it about him, looking out as sharply as a fox has just sat up a rain, and looks as if it was on a foggy morning;" and, with this cir- going to give us enough on't. You don't cumspection, he was not long in arriving mind doing a little dinner-work on a Sunday, within view of Ramsay's house. Like a I see. Shelling of beans, I s'pose, is tanta "Mistress Ramsay," said he, walking up to the dame, who was occupied at a table, with a large trencher before her, in which she was plying some household thrift, "luck to you, ma'am, to you, ma'am, and all your house! I hope you haven't none of these clinking and clattering bullies about you that are as thick over this country as the frogs in the kneading-troughs that they tell of?" Good lack, Mr. Horseshoe Robinson!" exclaimed the matron, offering the sergeant her hand. "What has brought you here? What news? Who are with you? For patience' sake, tell me!" "And a mount to dragging a sheep out of a pond, as the preachers allow on the Sabbath. Ha, ha! Where's Davy?" "He's gone over to the meeting-house on Ennoree, hoping to hear something of the army at Camden; perhaps you can tell us the news from that quarter?" "Faith, that's a mistake, Mistress Ramsay, though I don't doubt that they are hard upon the scratches by this time. But at this present speaking I command the flying artillery. We have but one man in the corps, and that's myself; and all the guns we have got is this piece of ordnance that hangs in this old belt by my side," pointing to his sword, "and that I captured from the enemy at Blackstock's. I was hoping I mought find John Ramsay at home: I have need of him as a recruit.' if they owned the fee-simple of everything on the plantation. And it made my blood rise, Mr. Horseshoe, to see them turn out in the yard and catch up my chickens and ducks, and kill as many as they could string about them, and I not daring to say a word, though I did give them a piece of my mind, too. "Who is at home with you?" inquired the sergeant, eagerly. "Nobody but my youngest boy, Andrew," answered the dame. "And then the filthy, toping rioters-" she continued, exalting her voice. "What arms have you in the house?" asked Robinson, without heeding the dame's rising anger. "We have a rifle, and a horseman's pistol that belongs to John. They must call for drink, too, and turn my house, of a Sunday morning, into a tavern—” "They took the route toward Ninety-Six, you said, Mistress Ramsay?" Yes, they went straight forward upon the road. But, look you, Mr. Horseshoe : you're not thinking of going after them?" "Isn't there an old field about a mile from here on that road?" inquired the sergeant, still intent upon his own thoughts. "Certain," replied the hostess. must remember the cobbler that died of drink on the roadside?" "Ah, Mr. Robinson, John has a heavy life of it over there with Sumter. The boy is often without his natural rest or a meal's victuals, and the general thinks so much of him that he can't spare him to come home. I haven't the heart to complain as long as John's service is of any account, but it does seem, Mr. Robinson, like needless tempting of the mercies of Providence. We thought that he might have been here to-day; yet I am glad he didn't come, for he would have been certain to get into trouble. Who should come in this morning, just after my husband husband had cleverly got away on his horse, but a young cock-a-whoop ensign that belongs to Ninety-Six, and four great Scotchmen with him, all in red coats? They had been out thieving, I warrant, and were now going home again. And who but they! Here to it?" they were swaggering all about my house, and calling for this, and calling for that, as "You "There is a shabby, racketty cabin in the middle of the field. Am I right, good woman?" Yes." "And nobody lives in it? It has no door 'There ha'n't been a family there these seven years." "I know the place very well," said the sergeant, thoughtfully; "there is woods just on this side of it." "That's true," replied the dame. "But what is it you are thinking about, Mr. Robinson ?" 46 How long before this rain began was it that they quitted this house?" "Not above fifteen minutes." "Mistress Ramsay, bring me the rifle and pistol both, and the powder-horn and bullets." "As you say, Mr. Horseshoe," answered the dame as she turned round to leave the room, “but I am sure I can't suspicion what you mean to do." In a few moments the woman returned with the weapons, and gave them to the sergeant. "Where is Andy?" asked Horseshoe. The hostess went to the door and called her son. Almost immediately afterward a sturdy boy of about twelve or fourteen years of age entered the apartment, his clothes dripping with rain. He modestly and shyly He modestly and shyly seated himself on a chair near the door, with his soaked hat flapping down over a face full of freckles, and not less rife with the expression of an open, dauntless hardihood of cha racter. "How would you like a scrummage, Andy, with them Scotchmen that stole your mother's chickens this morning?" asked Horseshoe. "I'm agreed," replied the boy, "if you will tell me what to do." "You are not going to take the boy out on any of your desperate projects, Mr. Horseshoe?" said the mother, with the tears starting instantly into her eyes. "You wouldn't take such a child as that into danger?" Bless your soul, Mistress Ramsay, there aren't no danger about it. Don't take on so. It's a thing that is either done at a blow or not done, and there's an end of it. I want the lad only to bring home the prisoners for me after I have took them." "Ah, Mr. Robinson, I have one son already in these wars, God protect him! And you men don't know how a mother's heart yearns for her children in these times. I cannot give another," she added as she threw her arms over the shoulders of the youth and drew him to her bosom. 66 'Oh, it ain't nothing," said Andrew, in a sprightly tone. "It's only snapping of a pistol, mother. Pooh! If I'm not afraid, you oughtn't to be." 'I give you my honor, Mistress Ramsay,” said Robinson, "that I will bring or send your son safe back in one hour, and that he sha'n't be put in any sort of danger whatsomedever. Come, that's a good woman!” "You are not deceiving me, Mr. Robinson?" asked the matron, wiping away a tear. "You wouldn't mock the sufferings of a weak woman in such a thing as this?" "On the honesty of a sodger, ma'am,” replied Horseshoe, "the lad shall be in no danger, as I said before, whatsomedever." Then I will say no more," answered the mother." But, Andy, my child, be sure to let Mr. Robinson keep before you." Horseshoe now loaded the firearms, and, having slung the pouch across his body, he put the pistol into the hands of the boy; then, shouldering his rifle, he and his young ally left the room. Even on this occasion, serious as it might be deemed, the sergeant did not depart without giving some manifestation of that light-heartedness which no dif ficulties ever seemed to have power to con- “Andy and me will teach them, Mistress Ramsay, Pat's point of war: we will surround the ragamuffins." Now, Andy, my lad," said Horseshoe, after he had mounted Captain Peter, "you must get up behind me. Turn the lock of your pistol down," he continued as the boy sprang upon the horse's rump, "and cover it with the flap of your jacket, to keep the rain off. It won't do to hang fire at such a time as this." The lad did as he was directed, and Horseshoe, having secured his rifle in the same way, put his horse up to a gallop and took the road in the direction that had been pursued by the soldiers. As soon as our adventurers had gained a wood at the distance of about half a mile the sergeant relaxed his speed and advanced but little above a walk. at a pace whole batch is there at this very point of time. We will go slowly along until we get to the other end of this wood, in sight of the old field, and then, if there is no one on the lookout, we will open our first trench. You know what that means, Andy?" "It means, I s'pose, that we'll go right smack at them," replied Andrew. Pretty exactly," said the sergeant. "But listen to me. Just at the edge of the woods you will have to get down and put yourself behind a tree. I'll ride forward as if I had a whole troop at my heels; and if I catch them, as I expect, they will have a little fire kindled, and, as likely as not, they'll be cooking some of your mother's fowls." "Yes, I understand," said the boy, eagerly. No, you don't," replied Horseshoe, “but you will when you hear what I am going to say. If I get at them onawares, they'll be mighty apt to think they are surrounded, and will bellow like fine fellows for quarters, and thereupon, Andy, I'll cry out, 'Stand fast!' as if I was speaking to my own men; and when you hear that, you must come up full tilt, because it will be a signal to you that the enemy has surrendered. Then it will be your business to run into the house and bring out the muskets as quick as a rat runs through a kitchen; and when you have done that, why all's done. But if you should hear any popping of firearms—that is, more than one shot, which I may chance to let off "Andy," he said, "we have got rather a ticklish sort of a job before us, so I must give you your lesson, which you will understand better by knowing something of my plan. As soon as your mother told me that these thieving villains had left her house about fifteen minutes before the rain came on, and that they had gone along upon this road, I remembered the old field up here, and the little log hut in the middle of it; and it was natural to suppose that they had just got about near that hut when this rain-do you take that for a bad sign and get came up, and then it was the most supposable case in the world that they would naturally go into it as the driest place they could find. So now, you see, it's my calculation that the away as fast as you can heel it. You comprehend?" "Oh yes,” replied the lad; "and I'll do what you want, and inore too, maybe, Mr. Robinson." |