CHAPTER V.
THE ADVANCED PICQUET.
"All quiet along the Potomac, they say,
Except now and then a stray picquet,
Is shot as he walks on his beat to and fro,
By a rifleman hid in the thicket.
'Tis nothing. A private or two now and then,
Will not count in the tale of the battle;
Not an officer lost—only one of the men,
Breathing out all alone the death-rattle."
"In the spring of the year '75, a party of ours, under Lord Rohallion, then a captain, was sent to the Fort of St. John, on the Richelieu River, to strengthen the garrison, which was composed of some companies of the 7th Fusiliers and the 26th, or Cameronians, under Major Preston, of Valleyfield, in Fifeshire, as gallant a fellow as ever bore the King's commission.
"We were in daily expectation of the advance of the rebel General Montgomery, with a great force, so the duties of guards and sentinels were performed with great vigilance, as the whole country for miles around, if not actually in possession of the armed colonists, was full of people who were favourable to their cause, and were consequently inimical to the king and to us.
"Montgomery was expected to approach through Vermont county (now one of the states) by the eastern shore of Lake Champlain, a long and narrow sheet of deep water, which forms the boundary between it and the State of New York; thus, on an eminence which commanded a considerable view of the country southward, and at the distance of two miles from Fort St. John, Major Preston, of the 26th, had an outpost or picquet, consisting of one officer and twenty men, stationed in a log-hut, from whence they were relieved every week. The officer in command of this advanced party had to throw forward a line of sentinels, extending across the road by which the Americans were expected to approach. At the hut was also a small piece of cannon, taken from a gunboat recently destroyed on the Lake, a 6-pounder, which was to be fired as a signal for the troops in Fort St. John to get under arms, and the picquet was well supplied with rockets to give the alarm by night.
"Our sentinels there had frequently been found dead and scalped, without a shot being fired. Sometimes they disappeared altogether, without leaving a trace, save a few spots of blood on the prairie grass. Their desertion was never suspected by those in authority; but that savages and assassins lurked in woods along the eastern and western shores of Lake Champlain we had not a doubt; thus the solitary outpost before the Fort of St. John was a duty disliked by all, and always undertaken with sensations of doubt and anxiety.
"It was on a beautiful afternoon in the month of September, that with a sergeant and twenty men of the Borderers, I took possession of this log hut, relieving a Lieutenant Despard, of the Fusiliers, from whom I received over my orders, and posted my line of six sentinels at intervals across the highway and a kind of open prairie which it traversed. These orders were written and delivered with the parole and countersign, by Major André, of the Cameronians (afterwards named 'the unfortunate'), and they were simply, that during the night the sentinels were to face all persons approaching their posts, to stand firm in a state of preparation at half-cock with ported arms, and to fire instantly on all who could not give the countersign.
"Despard informed me that excessive vigilance was necessary, as he had lost five sentinels in one week, information which made my fellows look somewhat blankly in each other's faces; 'and these assassinations have occurred,' he added, 'though we have an Indian scout, Le Vipre Noir, an invaluable fellow, however unpleasant his name may sound, attached to the picquet-house. I would advise you to keep off that bit of prairie in front, Middleton. Zounds! one is always over the ankles in mud there, and mid-leg deep occasionally; so it's more like snipe-shooting in an Irish bog, than knocking over Yankees and Iroquois.'
"I now found that there was another scout, a Cornishman, named old Abe Treherne, attached to the post, as well as the native mentioned by Despard.
"Abe Treherne was a white-haired squatter and pioneer, who, for more than forty years, had been in the district, living by the use of his rifle and hatchet. He wore an Indian hunting-shirt and deer-skin mocassins, and had so completely forgotten the civilization of his native England, that he had almost become an Indian by habit, if not by speech. He was brave, however, and a most faithful fellow to us. Active and hardy, brown and weatherbeaten by constant exposure; privation could not impair, nor toil weary his strength, which was wonderful, for, by the wild life of nature he had led, every muscle had been developed, till it became like a band of iron.
"The savage scout, Le Vipre Noir, as he was named, was one of the Lenni-Lenappe—or unmixed race as they boast themselves—who once occupied all the vast tract of country which lies between Penobscot and the shores of the Potomac; but we styled the most of them Delawares, and by that name they became known.
"Well, this devil of a Delaware—I think I can see the fellow now!—was a model of muscular strength and manly beauty, so far as form and sinew go. He was like a colossal statue of polished copper. His usual expression was fierce and sullen; his eyes were keen, black, and glittering, and his red and yellow streaks of war-paint lent a fiendish aspect to his dusky visage, the features of which were otherwise clean cut and regular. He was somewhat of a dandy in his own way, as his fur mocassins and hunting-shirt were gaily ornamented with scarlet cloth, wampum, and beads, by the Delaware girls.
"His head had been denuded of hair entirely, save the scalp-lock, in which two feathers were stuck. At his girdle hung his pipe and hunting-pouch, a large musk-rat skin, in the tail of which his keen-edged scalping-knife was sheathed; he had also a pouch for ammunition, a long rifle, and a tomahawk, which were never from his side by night or day.
"This Delaware was from one of the native villages about the upper end of the Penobscot river, where the chiefs had signed a treaty of alliance, offensive and defensive, with our government, and had sworn to have no communication with the Americans or others, the king's enemies, without the knowledge of the officer commanding the British forces in North America.
"One of our men, named Jack Andrews, had quarrelled with the Delaware, about a wild goose they had shot. Blows were exchanged; the savage drew his scalping-knife; but the Borderer clubbed his musket, and laid the red-skin sprawling among the reeds. Peace was enforced between them; but the savage was more than ever sullen and reserved, doubtless brooding on the vengeance he meant to take.
"Such was Le Vipre Noir, who will bear rather a conspicuous part in my little story.
"It was a lovely evening, I have said, when we took possession of the sequestered picquet-house. The rays of the setting sun, as he sank beyond those grand and lofty mountain ranges, which rise between the source of the Hudson and Lake Champlain, shed a red glow across the water, and bathed in warm light the foliage of the mighty primeval forest, which for ages had clothed the shores of that magnificent lake. In the immediate foreground the bayonets of my sentinels seemed tipped with fire, as they trod slowly to and fro upon their posts in that voiceless solitude. Before the log-hut the arms were piled, and my soldiers, with the Cornishman, were cooking their supper, while the swarthy Indian scout was squatted on his hams at a little distance, smoking listlessly or half asleep, as the duty of searching in the woods usually devolved upon him after nightfall.
"I, too, lit my pipe, and the pouch from which I took my tobacco called back to mind some half-forgotten thoughts and fancies.
"They were lovely hands that embroidered that pouch for me, and it was associated with many a promenade in Paul Street, when we were quartered in Montreal, with balls at her father's house, in the Rue de Notre Dame, flirtation and ices in the Place d'Armes, where the French troops used to parade of old—for, in short, that tobacco-pouch had been made for me by Ella Carleton, the belle of that old colonial city.
"She had a dash of the old French blood in her, and hence her dark hair and eyes, which contrasted so wonderfully with her pure English skin, and hence her continental form of eyelid and drooping lash. So I sighed as I thought of a year ago—cursed the emergencies of the service that banished me to Fort St. John, and passed my fair Ella's present to the sergeant of the picquet, that he might supply himself, for active service is a true leveller, and without impairing discipline leads to a spirit of camaraderie not to be found in such tented fields as Hyde Park or the Phœnix at Dublin.
"After the sun set and twilight stole on, I walked restlessly to and fro before the log-hut, within which my men were now gathered with their arms, as the dew was falling. I had seen all carefully loaded and had examined the flints and priming. I was resolved that due vigilance on my part should not be wanting if the post were attacked or my sentinels surprised; and to prevent them from wandering unconsciously from their beat in the dark, I had six white stakes placed in the ground, and gave orders that they were to remain close by them during the night, until relieved, and every hour I went in person with the reliefs, a most harassing duty.
"Leaving my sergeant at the picquet-house, a few minutes before midnight, I went with six men to relieve my sentinels, who were all posted on the skirts of an open spacs, a large tract of waste ground which for some miles was covered with long prairie grass, and which stretched away towards the forest that was traversed by the main road leading to Fort Edward on the Hudson, about sixty miles distant.
"Save the gurgle of a runnel that stole under the prairie grass, there was no sound in the air—not even the whistle of the cat-bird; there was no moon, but the stars were clear and bright, and guided by their light we went straight from post to post, relieving the sentinels; but as we approached the place where the sixth should have been, on the extreme left of the highway, we advanced unchallenged to the stake that marked his beat: the place was solitary and the man—was gone.
"His musket, undischarged, was lying there, and a pool of blood beside it at once refuted any suspicion of desertion. But how came it that he had perished without resistance—without giving an alarm, and where was his body? All round the place we searched for it, but did so in vain.
"Posting another man, I gave him reiterated orders and injunctions to be on the alert, and wistfully the poor fellow looked after us as we returned to the picquet-house with the tidings of another mystery, which added to the consternation that prevailed concerning this devilish outpost. Neither le Vipre Noir nor Treherne had yet returned; they were as usual scouting in front of our advanced sentinels, and when they came back, not together, but separately, they each reported the country all quiet for miles towards the mountains. Who then was this determined assassin, unless it were Satan himself?
"Next night the sentinel on the extreme right was missing, without leaving even a trace of blood, and without the grass being bruised or trodden near his beat; and on the night following, the sentinel on the roadway was found lying dead on his face; his musket was undischarged, his head cloven behind, and his scalp gone.
"The consternation of my picquet had now reached its height. Still our scouts asserted the country to be quiet around us, though, with a strange gleam in his eyes, the Indian said, that when he shouted in the woods he heard an echo.
"'From whence?' I asked, suspiciously.
"'From the great barrows by the lake—where the bones of my forefathers lie. The white man treads there now; but they were great warriors, and many were the scalps that dried before their tents.'
"I was but a young officer then, being fresh from our Scottish Fencibles, otherwise I would have doubled my sentinels; but the idea never occurred to me, and my sergeant failed to suggest it. The affair was becoming intolerable. This mysterious assassination of brave men roused my blood to fever heat, and I resolved that on the next night I should take the duty of sentinel with a firelock, and remain on my post as such, not for one hour merely, but for the entire night, in the hope of solving this terrible enigma.
"On the evening I came to this conclusion the post was visited by Charley Halket from the fort, the captain of our first company, who came cantering up on a fine bay horse. I was glad to see him, for Halket was one of the most lively and devil-may-care fellows in the corps, and he sang the best song and was the best stroke at billiards in our whole brigade. Charley would drink his two bottles at mess overnight and wing a fellow in the morning, without keeping his arm in a cold bath, and with an accuracy that showed he had a constitution of iron; he hunted fearlessly, shot fairly, rode like a mad-cap; gambled, but simply for excitement, and spent his money like a good-hearted fellow. He was always laughing and jovial, and I was about to relate the disasters that had befallen my party, when the pale and anxious expression of his usually merry face arrested me, and I feared that the fort had been taken by surprise in rear of our post.
"'What the devil is the matter, Halket?' said I. 'I have always predicted to Preston that we should never have our legs under his mahogany at Valleyfield again—never taste his Fifeshire mutton, or test his fine old Burgundy. What is up? Has the fort fallen, Charley, that you come here with your bay thoroughbred covered with foam, even to its bang-up tail?'
"'No, my dear Middleton; but I wish to pass your post.'
"'To the front?' I asked, with astonishment.
"'Yes.'
"'It is impossible!'
"'Even if out of uniform?'
"'In or out of uniform, none can pass or repass save our scouts, whose lives are of little value. Preston's orders are strict and decisive.'
"'But if in disguise?' he urged, earnestly, and lowering his tone, as he stooped from his saddle.
"'Worse and worse!'
"'How? explain, pray,' he demanded, as his earnestness became tinged with irritation.
"'You might be deemed a deserter by General Burgoyne if found more than two miles from camp or quarters.'
"'A deserter!—I?—pooh, man, absurd!'
"'A general officer has joined the rebels already. Then you might be hanged as a spy by Montgomery, whose troops are certainly closing up, if we may judge from the murderous outrages committed by his Indian allies upon the picquets stationed here.'
"'It is for that very reason, Middleton, that I am most anxious to ride southward for about twelve miles into the country along the shore of the lake, towards Misiskoui.'
"'You could not return; my sentinels have positive orders to fire instantly on all——'
"'Who have not the parole and countersign,' said he, smiling; 'they are Quebec and WOLFE. You see that I have both!'
"'From whom?'
"'My friend André, of the Cameronians—the fort-major.'
"'He is very rash! I wish he had this infernal picquet to command; the duty might teach him caution.'
"'But, my dear Middleton——'
"'Say no more, Charley—come, don't be rash; duty is duty; and I must perform mine. Moreover, I value your life and my own honour too much to risk either to further some mad-cap ramble of yours.'
"'Zounds, sir!' he began, furiously.
"'Now don't call me out, Charley; I am on duty and can't go, and when I am relieved and you are cool, you won't ask me. But tell me, Charley, what affair is this that seems so urgent? The country in front is full of perils; already eight or nine sentinels have been assassinated, and yonder grave covers one of three fine fellows I have lost.'
"'Listen to me, Jack,' said he, dismounting, and throwing the reins of his horse over his arm, and leading me a little way apart from the soldiers who were smoking and lounging before the log-hut; 'you remember Ella Carleton?'
"'I should rather think I do' said I, reddening, and giving him a very knowing wink, to which he made not the slightest response; 'Ella, whom we used to meet so much a year ago at Montreal.'
"'The same,' said he.
"'I remember her perfectly—a charming girl, with features that were pale but beautifully regular, and with eyes and hair so dark.'
"'Exactly,' said Halket, whose eyes sparkled with pleasure. 'Her father, you are aware, is a rich land-owner, in the American interest.'
"'Many a bottle of champagne I have drunk in his house in the Rue de Notre Dame.'
"'Yet he is an old curmudgeon who hates us red-coats, and for that reason, as well as for a few others that were more cogent, Ella and I were privately married about a year ago.'
"'Married?—whew! Here's news for the mess to discuss over their wine and walnuts!' I exclaimed, while laughing to conceal an irrepressible emotion of pique.
"'I depend on your honour,' said he, earnestly.
"'To the death, Charley; but you have quite taken my breath away. Married—you never looked a bit like it!'
"'We were married a year ago at the cathedral in the Place d'Armes unknown to all—even to yourself, Rohallion, and others my most intimate friends,' said Halket, speaking rapidly and with growing emotion; 'in a month she will be a mother—think of that, Jack! She is residing at one of her father's country clearings near the Missiskoui River, in an old hunting-lodge, built by Simon de Champlain, who first discovered the lake. She has written to me by a circuitous route, saying that Montgomery's advanced posts are within a few miles; that her father and all his men are with the rebels; that the Iroquois are ravaging the country, burning, killing, and scalping all before them; and thus, for the love I bear her, and for the sake of our child that is yet unborn, I must strive to save her, and have her conveyed to Fort St. John. This is all my story, Middleton. She is about twelve miles distant from this outpost; I think I know the way, and am certain I should be back before the morning-gun is fired. If not, I must risk all—commission, rank, reputation, everything—but Ella must be saved! You understand me now, don't you, my dear friend?' said he, earnestly, as he grasped my hand, and I could see that the poor fellow's eyes were filled with tears.
"'Perfectly, Charley; I would risk my life to save or serve her or you; but I think we may find those who will do both more effectually than either you or I.'
"'Who do you mean?'
"'The Delaware scout, and old Abe Treherne, the hunter, will get over the ground in half the time, and knowing, as they do, every track and trail in the forest, with ten degrees more safety than you could ever hope for.'
"I at once proposed the affair to them, and Treherne entered into it with great readiness. His reward was to be a pair of handsome pistols and ten guineas. He knew the old hunting-lodge on Carleton's clearing quite well, and with the assistance of the horse, undertook to bring the lady to the picquet-house in safety, and long before sunrise. The Delaware, however, shook his head.
"'Le Vipre Noir has some darned doubts, I guess,' said the hunter; 'the woods about the Missiskoui are full of the mocassin prints of the Yankees and the Iroquois; the tracks, I reckon, are dangerous enough; and there will be an almighty trouble in bringing a fine lady a-horse-back through the bush; for all that, Delaware, you'll venture to bring the White Chief his squaw safe from the hunting-place beyond the river?'
"'From the Missiskoui, where once I had a wigwam, and where my squaw and her little papooses perished at the hands of the white men?' said the savage, in a husky and guttural voice, while his stealthy eyes filled with a malevolent gleam, as he sat sullenly smoking under a tree.
"'You're a darned fool, Vipre,' said Treherne, angrily. 'Look ye har—what's the use o' thinking o' that now? What's past is past, ain't it?'
"'She appealed to them, and they laughed at her. She appealed to Manitto, but his face was hidden behind a cloud, and he saw neither her nor what the pale-faces did to her. She is with Manitto now—but I yet am here.'
"'We may have a scrimmage, Delaware—can you bite yet?' asked Treherne, testily.
"The savage pointed to his scalping-knife and grinned.
"'Will you venture with me for twelve bottles of the raal Jamaiky fire-water?'
"'Oui, ja, yes!' said the savage, eagerly, in his mixed jargon; 'I neither fear the feathered arrows of the rebel Iroquois, or the lead bullets of the Yankees. Go! Le Vipre Noir is a warrior!'
"'Delaware,' said I, patting his muscular shoulder, 'what are the greatest of human virtues?'
"'Courage and contempt of death,' he replied, loftily, while shaking the two heron's plumes in his scalp lock.
"'Good,' said Halkett, who had listened to all this preamble with irrepressible anxiety and impatience; 'here are ten guineas as an earnest of future reward, Delaware. You will risk this for me?'
"'For you?' said the Indian, scornfully, putting the coins, however, in the musk-rat pouch, which dangled at his wampum girdle.
"'For her, then?' said Halket, persuasively.
"'For neither,' replied the Delaware, while a lurid gleam shone in his sombre eyes.
"'How, fellow?' asked Charley, with alarm.
"'I do so for the reward—for the fire-water and gold that will buy me powder and blankets; but neither for the squaw nor the papoose of the pale-face.'
"'Risk it for what you will, but only serve me; and you, Treherne——'
"'Make your terms with this darned crittur of a Redskin, and you can settle with me after, sir,' said Treherne, who had been regarding his compatriot with a somewhat doubtful expression. 'Come, Vipre Noir, we must keep the hair on our heads, if we can, certainly; so put fresh priming into the pan of your rifle, my dark serpent, for the dew is falling heavily; if the rebel Redskins come on us, it must be our scalps agin theirs! I'm your brother—let us be off to the bush ere the sun sets.'
"Charley Halkett hastily wrote a note to his wife, telling her to place implicit confidence in the two scouts as true and tried men, who would convey her safely to the British outpost in front of Fort St. John, where he, all eagerness and impatience, awaited her; and on being furnished with this, Treherne slung his long rifle across his body, stuck a short black pipe in his moustachioed mouth, mounted Halkett's horse, and, with the swift-footed and agile Indian running by his side, crossed the open bit of prairie before the log-hut, and rapidly disappeared in the dense and virgin forest that lay beyond.
"That forest soon grew dark; twilight stole along the shores of the silent lake; the last red rays of lingering light faded upward from the lone mountain tops; one by one the bright stars came twinkling out, and the old and clamorous anxiety occurred to us all; and each poor fellow, as he was left on his post, felt himself a doomed man, who might die without seeing his destroyer, or who might disappear as others had so mysteriously done, without leaving a trace behind.
"Slowly and wearily our autumn night wore on, and with our pistols cocked, Halkett and I visited the sentinels almost half-hourly. The sky was moonless, and the silence around our lonely post was oppressive; to the listening ear there came no sounds save those of insect life among the long and reedy prairie grass.
"All at once, afar in distance from the deep recesses of the vast pine forest, there rose the shrill war-whoop of the red man!
"Like the yell of an unchained fiend, it rung upon the still night air; but died away, and all became silent—more silent apparently than before, and I felt the hand of Halkett clutch my arm like a vice, while hot bead-drops rolled over his temples.
"I had terrible forebodings, but remained silent, and with reiterated advice to my sentinels to be 'on the alert,' returned to the picquet-house. Poor Charley Halkett's alarm excited all my compassion; the boldest, frankest, and jolliest fellow in the corps had become a nervous, crushed, and miserable wretch!
"I thought that lingering night would never pass away. It passed, however, as others do; the morning came in, bright and sunny, and without one of our sentinels being missed or molested; and it seemed, certainly, a very singular feature in those mysterious deaths, that the only night on which no fatality occurred, should be that on which we actually had an alerte, and when Treherne and the Delaware were away in the direction of Missiskoui, and not scouting in front of the post!
"Morning had come, but there was yet no appearance of our messengers or Ella Carleton, and old sympathies made me doubly anxious on her account.
"Halkett, who was pale with sleeplessness and intense anxiety, walked with me a little way beyond our advanced sentinels, who were now shouting to each other their happy congratulations that nothing had occurred during the night—in short, that they were all there.
"Lake Champlain, in its calm loveliness, shone brightly under the morning sun, its surface unruffled by the wind, and not a sail or boat was visible in all the blue extent of its far stretching vista. The gorgeous azalias were still in their bloom, so were the snowy blossoms of the sumach, and the glorious yellow light fell in flakes between the towering pines of the ancient forest, while the dewy prairie grass glittered as it rippled beneath the pleasant breeze.
"The distant landscape and the dim blue hills that look down on the winding Hudson seemed calm and tranquil, the silence around us was intense, the hum of a little waterfall alone breaking the stillness of the autumn morning.
"Poor Charley was like a madman, and it was in vain that I suggested to him that Treherne and the Delaware might have been compelled to make a long detour; that Ella might be ill and unable to travel on horseback, that her father might have returned, that Montgomery's advanced guard might be now far beyond the Missiskoui, that our scouts might have lost their way in going or in returning, not that I believed either possible for a moment, but I was glad to say anything that would serve to account for their delay, or soothe his gnawing anxiety; so in exceeding misery he returned to Fort St. John. The moment that morning parade was over he hastened to me again, and slowly the terrible day passed over, without tidings of Ella Carleton or her guides, and as night drew near I had almost to use force to prevent Halkett from setting out on foot for the old hunting-lodge on the Missiskoui, a place he could never have reached alone.
"Suddenly we were roused, about sunset, by a shout from the picquet, and as we looked up, the Delaware stood before us—alone!
"His aspect was fierce but weary; his hunting shirt was torn and bore traces of blood. His story was brief. They had been attacked by Indians in a deep gulley some miles distant, in the grey dawn of the morning; Treherne had been killed and the lady carried off! The Indian showed his wounds, and then claimed his reward.
"Poor Halkett, on hearing of this catastrophe, fell, as if struck by a ball, and was laid on the hard bed of planks whereon the soldiers slept. He was in a delirium, yet passive and weak as a child.
"So the hostile Indians were in our neighbourhood! I thought with horror of what the poor girl—on the eve of becoming a mother—might suffer at their merciless hands; and all her delicate beauty, her merry laugh, the singular combination of elegance and espièglerie in her manner, came vividly back to memory, as I had seen her last, happy, radiant, and smiling, amid the glare and glitter of a garrison ball in the city of Montreal.
"I questioned the Delaware closely; but his story was simple and unvarying, so he received food, rum, and the reward which Halkett had promised.
"An irrepressible anxiety stole over me as night deepened, so taking my servant's musket and bayonet, I primed, loaded, and fixed a new flint with care; and proceeding to the distance of fifty yards in front of my line of sentinels, on the open space where the prairie grass grew thick and rank, I resolved to pass some hours there as an advanced sentinel.
"The sky was dark and cloudy, the stars were obscured by vapour, the silence was intense, and it smote upon my heart with a sense that was in some degree appalling, though I knew that my sentinels and the rest of the picquet were all within hail. The tall prairie grass waved solemnly and noiselessly to and fro; the sombre forest beyond, with the myriad cones of its black pines stretched far away to the distant mountains, but not a sound came from thence, nor from the lone shores of the vast lake of Champlain, whose vista receded away for miles upon my right. Even if the night-herons were wading among its waters I could not hear them, and the whistle of the cat-bird was silent.
"Through the dark, I could see where the wild sumach, with its white blossoms and scarlet berries, waved over the graves of those who had perished on this fatal out-post. Their aspect was solemnizing in such a dark and silent hour, and the familiar faces of the dead men seemed to hover before me. But there was something mysterious and unaccountable in the total disappearance of those whose blood we had only traced upon the grass of the prairie.
"Around where I stood this grass was more than a yard in height and thick as ripened corn. It was waving steadily to and fro as the breath of the night wind agitated it.
"I had been in that solitary place about two hours, and midnight was at hand, when an emotion like a thrill—a tremor, not of fear, but of warning—a 'grue,' as we Scots call it, came over me. I felt the approach of some unseen thing, and cast a hurried glance around me. Something unusual about the appearance of the prairie-grass caught my eye.
"Where, when hitherto I had looked in a direct line to the front, the surface, while swaying to and fro, seemed a flat and unbroken mass, there was now visible a dark line, a hollow furrow, as if some animal was crawling slowly and stealthily through it.
"With every nerve braced, with all the pow