in ecstasy, "lemme go, too. Ah'll never ast ye nothin' again,
Ah swear Ah won't. _Please_, Missa Bob."

"Can't do it, Scipio," said Bob, kindly. "You're the only man we've got
to look after these creatures. Here, don't let your eyes pop out of
your head. I tell you, you drive to Mr. Baron's and tie the horse and
the mule,--tie 'em strong, mind,--and then you can come up the other
side and meet us."

Scipio's mournful eyes followed the disappearing forms with an
appreciation of their purpose rather than of the picturesqueness of
their appearance. The flaming lights grew silent as the distance became
too great for his ear to catch their sizzling. They danced hither and
yon,--now scattered, now flashing in a bunch. He followed the course of
a very bright one as it appeared and vanished, but went always on and
up.

"Ah 'low dat's Missa Bob's," said the loyal little soul. "He sho' would
have de bigges'."

On the hill-side the men opened their line to cover a wide stretch of
the mountain, and plunged upward through the scrub of pines and oaks.
There was much running about of the dogs, and desultory barking,
corrected by spicy admonitions from their masters, until the ascent's
steepness forced silence upon them by the weapon of difficult
breathing.

Once 'Gene Frady tripped on a root and fell headlong, pitching his
torch into the dry duff a man's length before him. There was a rush to
stamp out the incipient fire, the autumn terror of the forests, before
any one lent a hand to help the fallen. Robertson went half-way up his
leggings in a spring, and stood swearing fiercely, while the rest
jeered at him and ordered him to move on before he muddied up a good
drinking-place. Bob and Friedrich pushed on on adjoining courses, an
occasional cry of "_malerisch_," or "_zauberisch_," showing that von
Rittenheim was regarding the scene as well as the sport. On the other
side of Bob climbed Wendell, sullenly self-reproachful in the Baron's
presence, yet of too exuberant a nature not to be alive to the
excitement of the chase.

Of a sudden a hound gave voice,--the bay that makes hunters of us all.
The other dogs rushed to his standard, yelping, barking, galloping from
all directions across their masters' paths, until the forest seemed
suddenly alive with them. One after another found, and added his note
to the general cry that trailed off into the distance. The men who had
started to follow paused, and the rest drew together.