*

In an hour and a half we reached our second night's lodging place; and next day, at noon, the girls being committed to the junior gentlemen to escort to Sugartown, the residence of Mr. Blank, he and the author took the episodial journey, described in the following chapter.

66

CHAPTER XLV.

Shaking his trident, urges on his steeds,

Who with two feet beat from their brawny breasts
The foaming billow; but their hinder parts

Swim, and go smooth against the curling surge."

WE parted from our young folks, at an obscure trace, leading Mr. B. and Mr. C. away to the left towards Big Possum Creek; along which, somewhere in the woods, Mr. Blank expected to meet an ecclesiastical body, of which he was a member.

The spot was found late that night; but as yet no delegates had appeared, and when next day at three o'clock, P.M. a single clergyman appeared, jaded and muddy, and reported the waters as too high for members in certain directions to come at all, the whole affair was postponed till the subsidence of the flood; or, it was adjourned till dry weather!

Mr. Blank being an officer of the general government, and having important matters demanding his immediate attention, now took me aside, and began as follows:"Mr. Carlton, do you want to try a little more backwood's life?"

"Why?"

"Because, if possible, I should like to reach my house to-night."

To-night! !—why 'tis half-past three! and your house is at least thirty-five miles

"Yes, by the trace, up Big Possum-but in a straight line through the woods 'tis not over twenty-five miles." "But there is no road?"

"I don't want any; the sun is bright, and by sun-down, we shall strike a new road laid out last fall; and that I can follow in the night."

"I have never, Mr. B. swum a horse; and I confess I'm a leetle timid; and we cannot expect even canoes where there are no settlements

"Oh! never fear, I'll go ahead; beside, Big Possum is all that is very seriously in the way; and I think it will hardly swim us now-come, what do you say—will you go?"

"Well-let's see; twenty-five miles-no road, no settlement, won't quite swim, maybe-new road in the darkpretty fair for a tyro, Mr. Blank; but I can't learn sooner; I'll go, sir--let us be off at once then."

Our friends expressed some surprise, and used some dehortation; but the bold, energetic, and cautious character of Mr. B. was well known, and hence no great fears were either expressed or felt for our safety. Accordingly, after a hasty kind of dinner-supper, we were mounted, and started away in the fashion of boys' foot races, prefaced by the formula-"are you saddled?-are you bridled??-whip!-start !—and Go-o! !"

Big Possum was soon reached; and as there was no ford established by law or custom, it was to be forded at a venture. My friend sought, indeed, not for a place less deep apparently, but for one less impeded by bushes and briars, and then in he plunged, "accoutred as he was, and bade me follow." And so, indeed, I did boldly, and promptly; for my courage was really so modest as to need the stimulus of a blind and reckless conduct. Hence, all I knew was a "powerful heap" of water in my boots again, and an uneasy wet sensation in the saddle-seat*—with a

* I hope the Magazines won't be hard on the grammar here—it is so great a help to our delicacy-a double intender like.

curious sinking of the horses "hinder parts," as if he kicked at something and could not hit it-and then a hard scramble of his fore legs in the treacherous mud of a bank; and then this outcry of Mr. Blank, as he turned an instant in his saddle to watch my emersion :—

"Well done! Carlton! well done! You'll be a woods. man yet! Come, keep up-the worst is over."

Reader! I do think praise is the most magical thing in nature! In this case it nearly dried my inexpressibles! And on I followed, consoling myself for the other water in the boots, by singing-" possum up a gum tree!"

"Hulloo! Mr. B. how are you steering? by the

moss ?"

"No-by the shadows."

"Shadows! how's that?"

"Our course is almost North East-the sun is nearly West-so cutting the shadows of the trees at the present angle, we'll strike the road, this rate, about sun-set."

I had travelled by the moss, a good general guide, the north and north-west sides of trees, having more and darker moss than the others; I had gone by a compass in a watch key-by blazes--by the under side of leaves recently upturned, a true Indian trace, as visible to the practiced eye as the warm scent to a hound's nose-and by the sun, moon, or stars; I had, in dark days, gone with comrades, who by keeping some fifty yards apart in a line, could correct aberrations; but never had I thought of our present simple and infallible guide!

Man maybe, as some think, very low in the intellectual scale, and yet he has one mark of divine resemblance-he always is in search of simple agents and means, and when found, he uses them in producing the greatest effects. Witness here man's contrivances for navigating through the air and the waters, and for crossing deserts and solitudes ! Laugh if you will, but I do confess that as we bounded along

that beautiful sunny afternoon and evening, I felt how like gods we availed ourselves of reason, in that wilderness without squatters, without blazes, without dry leaves, having no compass, and indifferent to moss; ay, and I smiled at the grim trees, while we cut athwart their black shadows at the proper angle, and heard from den and ravine and cliff the startled echoes crying out in amazement, in answering clatter and clang of hoofs and clamour of human voices !

For many miles the land was low and level, and mostly covered with water in successive pools, seeming, at a short distance, like parts of one immense lake of the woods! These pools were rarely more than a few inches deep, unless in cavities where trees had been torn up by their roots, and such holes were easily avoided by riding around the prostrate tops. My friend had not expected quite so much water; for he now called out at intervals

"Come on! Carlton! we mustn't be caught here in the dark-the sun's getting low-can you keep up?"

"Ay-ay!—go on!-go on !"

And then, after every such exhortation and reply, as if all past trotting had been walking, away, away we splashed, not kicking up a dust, but a mimic shower of aqueous particles, and many a smart sprinkle of mud, that rattled like hail on the leaves above, and the backs and shoulders below! Never did I believe how a horse can go !—at least through mud and water! True, I did often think of "the merciful man, merciful to his beast"-but I thought in answer, that hay and oats were as scarce in the swamp as hog and hominy; and hence, that for all our sakes we had better bestir matters a little extra for an hour or two, that all might get to "entertainment for man and horse."

Hence, finally, we gave up all talking, singing, humming, and whistling, and all conjecturing and wishing; and set in to plain, unostentatious hard riding, kicking and whipping, VOL. II.-6

our respective "critturs" so heartily as to leave no doubt somewhere under their hides, of our earnestness and haste; and, therefore, about half an hour after sunset, we gained or struck the expected road, where, although not yet free from the waters, we had no more apprehension of losing the course.

This road was, in truth, a new new road; and not like some new new roads, new theatres and so forth that have had a patent for immortality and been fresh with youth for half a century.* And, happily, our road had never been cut up by a wagon, being only an opening twelve yards wide, full of stumps, and for a few miles a-head, full of water. Without a fixed purpose, therefore, we could not wander from the partially illuminated and comparatively unimpeded way; and hence twilight as it was, on we splattered and splashed in all the glory and plenitude of mudhail, and dirt-coloured rain.

At last we re-entered the dry world-a high and rolling country. As it was, however, then profoundly dark, our concluding five miles were done in a walk, slow, solemn, and funereal; till at half past ten o'clock that night we dismounted or disembarked, wet, weary, and hungry, at Mr. B.'s door and there we were more than welcomed by his family, and all our boys and girls snug and safe from the late perils of woods and waters.

:

* However, new books now-a-days are exempt from the remarkbeing no more than literary fungi. Our fathers liked stale new things -the sons prefer new things that have a smell and die.