miles away to give the warning.
Every now and then the axeman stopped cutting and listened, and then
went on again. He had cut down a half-dozen trees and formed a barricade
which it would take hours to clear away before cavalry could pass, when,
stopping to listen, he heard a sound that caused him to put down his
axe: the sound of horses splashing along through the mud. His practised
ear told him that there were only three or four of them, and he took up
his gun and climbed up on the barricade and waited. Presently the little
squad of horsemen came in sight, a mere black group in the road. They
saw the dark mass lying across the road and reined in; then after a
colloquy came on down slowly. Darby waited until they were within fifty
yards of his barricade, and then fired at the nearest one. A horse
wheeled, plunged, and then galloped away in the darkness, and several
rounds from pistols were fired toward him, whilst something went on
on the ground. Before he could finish reloading, however, the men had
turned around and were out of sight. In a minute Darby climbed over the
barricade and strode up the road after them. He paused where the man he
had shot had fallen. The place in the mud was plain; but his comrades
had taken him up and carried him off. Darby hurried along after them.
Day was just breaking, and the body of cavalry were preparing to leave
their bivouac when a man emerged from the darkness on the opposite side
of the camp from that where Little Darby had been felling trees,
and walked up to the picket. He was halted and brought up where the
fire-light could shine on him, and was roughly questioned--a tall young
countryman, very pale and thin, with an old ragged slouched hat pulled
over his eyes, and an old patched uniform on his gaunt frame. He did not
seem at all disturbed by the pistols displayed around him, but seated
himself at the fire and looked about in a dull kind of way.

"What do you want?" they asked him, seeing how cool he was.

"Don't you want a guide?" he asked, drawlingly.

"Who are you?" inquired the corporal in charge. He paused.

"Some calls me a d'serter," he said, slowly.

The men all looked at him curiously.

"Well, what do you want?"

"I thought maybe as you wanted a guide," he said, quietly.

"We don't want you. We've got all the guide we want," answered the
corporal, roughly, "and we don't want any spies around here either, you
understand?"

"Does he know the way? All the cre