he great
expanse of cultivated lands had given way to lower ground and the wide
liberties of the "open swamp," as it was called. This dense wilderness
stretched out on every side; the gigantic growth of gum trees was
leafless at this season, and without a suggestion of underbrush.

The ground was as level as a floor. Generally during the winter the open
swamp is covered with shallow water, but in this singularly droughty
season it had remained "with dry feet," according to the phrase of that
country. The southern moon, rising far along its levels, began to cast
burnished golden shafts of light adown its unobstructed vistas. It might
seem some magnificent park, with its innumerable splendid trees, its
great expanse, and ever and anon in the distance the silver sheen of
the waters of a lake, shining responsive to the lunar lustre as with
an inherent lustre of its own. On and on he went, his noiseless tread
falling as regularly as machinery, leaving miles behind him, the
distance only to be conjectured by the lapse of time, and, after so
long, his flagging strength. He began to notice that the open swamp was
giving way in the vicinity of one of the lakes to the characteristics of
the swamp proper, although the ground was still dry and the going good.
He had traversed now and then a higher ridge on which switch-cane grew
somewhat sparsely, but near the lake on a bluff bank a dense brake of
the heavier cane filled the umbrageous shadows, so tall and rank and
impenetrable a growth that once the fugitive paused to contemplate it
with the theory that a secret intrusted to its sombre seclusions might
be held intact forever.

As he stood thus motionless in the absolute stillness, a sudden thought
came to his mind--a sudden and terrible thought. He could not be sure
whether he had heard aught, or whether the sight of the water suggested
the idea. He knew that he could little longer sustain his flight,
despite his vigor and strength. Quivering in every fibre from his long
exertions, he set his course straight for that glimmering sheen of
water. Encircling it were heavy shadows. Tall trees pressed close to
the verge, where lay here a fallen branch, and there a rotten log, half
sunken in mud and ooze, and again a great tangle of vines that had grown
smiling to the summer sun, but now, with the slow expansion of the lake
which was fed by a surcharged bayou, quite submerged in a fretwork of
miry strands. The margin was fringed with sa