st work you happened to touch upon, we have no
condesentious scruples against a fair rap or two over the knowledge-box,
and the tripping-up of a fractious chap's heels, in the way of a sort of
a rough-and-tumble, which, may be, you understand. You have been long
enough here, mayhap, to find that out."

"Then, it is likely, it would please you to have a chance at such a
game? I count myself a pretty tolerable hand at the play," said the
stranger, with a composure corresponding to that exhibited by Horse
Shoe.

"Ho, ho! I don't want to hurt you, man," replied the Sergeant. "You will
get yourself into trouble. You are hot-headeder than is good for your
health."

"As the game was mentioned, I thought you might have a fancy to play
it."

"To be sure I would," said Horse Shoe, "rather than disappoint you in
any reasonable longing. For the sake of quiet--being a peaceable man, I
will take the trouble to oblige you. Where, do you think, would be the
likeliest spot to have it?"

"We may readily find a piece of ground at hand," replied the other. "It
is a good moonlight play, and we may not be interrupted if we get a
little distance off before the negro comes back. Toe to toe, and face to
face, suits me best with both friend and foe."

"A mule to drive and a fool to hold back, are two of the contrariest
things I know," said Robinson, "and so, seeing that you are in arnest
about it, let us go at it without more ado upon the first good bit of
grass we can pop upon along the river."

In this temper the two antagonists left the vicinity of the stable, and
walked some hundred paces down along the bank of the stream. The man
with whom Horse Shoe was about to hold this strange encounter, and who
now walked quietly by his side, had the erect and soldierly port of a
grenadier. He was square-shouldered, compact and muscular, and the
firmness of his gait, his long and easy stride, and the free swing of
his arm as he moved onward in the moonlight, showed Robinson that he was
to engage with an adversary of no common capacity. There was, perhaps,
on the other side, some abatement in this man's self-confidence, when
the same light disclosed to his deliberate inspection the brawny
proportions of the sergeant, which, in the engrossment of the topics
bandied about in the late dialogue, he had not so accurately regarded.

When they had walked the distance I have mentioned, they had little
difficulty to select a space of level ground with