their force--the foot-tracks first seen
being evidently those of another division. As the corporal and his few
men continued, from the low and thick brushwood, to make their
reconnaisance of the enemy, they observed with delight that they were not
regulars, but a militia force. With this one animating thought, they
again, with noiseless step, regained the forest, and proceeded upon their
way. Scarcely, however, had they marched a mile, when the sound of
voices and loud laughter apprised them that another party was near,
which, as well as they could observe in the increasing gloom, was still
larger than the former. They were now obliged to make a considerable
circuit, and advance still deeper into the forest--their anxiety hourly
increasing, lest the enemy should reach the Fort before themselves. In
this dilemma it was resolved that the party should separate--the corporal
determining to proceed alone by the river bank, while the others, by a
detour of some miles, should endeavour to learn the force of the Yankees,
and, as far as they could, their mode of attack. From that instant the
corporal knew no more; for, after two hours' weary exertion, he reached
the Fort, which, had it been but another mile distant, his strength had
not held out for him to attain.

However gladly poor O'Flaherty might have hailed such information under
other circumstances, now it came like a thunderbolt upon him. Six of his
small force were away, perhaps ere this made prisoners by the enemy;
the Yankees, as well as he could judge, were a numerous party; and he
himself totally without a single adviser--for Malone had dined, and was,
therefore, by this time in that pleasing state of indifference, in which
he could only recognise an enemy, in the man that did not send round the
decanter.

In the half indulged hope that his state might permit some faint exercise
of the reasoning faculty, O'Flaherty walked towards the small den they
had designated as the mess-room, in search of his brother officer.

As he entered the apartment, little disposed as he felt to mirth at such
a moment, the tableau before him was too ridiculous not to laugh at. At
one side of the fire-place sat Malone, his face florid with drinking, and
his eyeballs projecting. Upon his head was a small Indian skull cap,
with two peacock feathers, and a piece of scarlet cloth which hung down
behind. In one hand he held a smoking goblet of rum punch, and in the
other a long, Ind