mooth by treading on the fallen foliage of the
pines. Rash procedure!

I had come into the road near what is called "the court-house mill
hill," intending to go down, cross the bridge, and turn again into the
woods in the rear of the village, scouting as I proceeded. When I had
come nearly to the brow of the hill, I met a squadron of ascending
Federal horsemen. If I had been two minutes earlier and they as much
later we would have met as I was descending the hill; and then my
capture would have been inevitable, because the steep banks on either
side would have precluded all hope of escape. I heard the foremost
riders say, "Here're the Rebels, boys; come on." I did not wait to see
more than their heads and breasts as they were coming up the hill. I was
in my full uniform, having a gray overcoat on my shoulder and a felt hat
on my head. In the twinkling of an eye the coat was dropped, and the
hat flew off as I made such a leap into the friendly forest as perhaps
was never equaled by any athlete in the Olympic games. I had no time to
become frightened, but I was angered by being pursued on my native soil
by men who had no right to invade it. It is a wonder that they did not
catch me. I heard them swearing, crying "Halt," and firing pistols.
Three things favored me: the trees and undergrowth were coming into
leaf, I was fleet of foot, and I took an unsuspected direction. Instead
of running at right angles to the road, or obliquely backward, I ran
obliquely forward, in the direction from which they had come. When I was
nearly out of breath, I stopped to listen, and was glad to hear no
sounds save those that were made by my thumping heart. The pursuit had
ended, and I lay down to rest and to recover my wind,--not unlike the
stag that had been chased by Fitz James' hounds.

In a little while rising refreshed from my rest, I went onward and
crossing the mill stream higher up than I had purposed, I arrived at the
residence of my cousin Robert. I had been there but a few minutes when
his wife, who had glanced up the lane, cried out, "Run, run; the Yankees
are coming!" At the first utterance of the word "run," I was making
rapid tracks for the forest in the rear of the house; but before I
reached it she called me back. Two of the Yankees had been there before,
and her excited imagination had mistaken a Rebel officer for two more.
It was her brother-in-law, Ned Stakes, major of the 40th Virginia. He
and I then set out for a place