rginny--but lastly from Wat
Adair's."

"Wat's wife is a relation of my family."

"Then he is a filthy disgrace to all who claim kin with him, Allen
Musgrove. Wat was the man who put us into the wild-cat's claws--at
least, so we had good reason to think. There was a tidy, spruce, and
smart little wench there--tut, man--I am talking of your own kith and
kindred, for her name was Mary Musgrove."

"Our girl!" said the dame with an animated emphasis; "our own Mary; what
of _her_, Mr. Horse Shoe Robinson?"

"That she is as good a child, Mistress Musgrove, as any honest parent
mought wish for. She got some sort of inkling of what was contrived; and
so she appeared to Major Butler in a dream--or her ghost."

"Mercy on us! the child has not been hurt?" cried the mother.

"Ondoubtedly not, ma'am," said Robinson; "but it is as true as you are
there, she gave us, somehow or other, a warning that there was harm in
the wind; and we took her advice, but it didn't do."

"I wish the child were home," said Musgrove. "Christopher, at daylight,
boy, saddle a horse and be off to Adair's for Mary."

The nephew promised to do the errand.

"Come, Mr. Robinson, draw near the table and eat something."

"With right good heart," replied Horse Shoe; "but it's a kind of camp
rule with me, before I taste food--no matter where--just to look after
Captain Peter Clinch; that's my horse, friend Musgrove. So, by your
leave, I'll just go take a peep to see that the Captain is sarved. A
good beast is a sort of right arm in scrapish times; and as God ha'n't
given them the gift of speech, we must speak for them."

"Christopher shall save you the trouble," replied Musgrove.

"A good horse never loses anything by the eye of his master," said Horse
Shoe; "so, Christopher, I'll go with you."

In a short time the sergeant returned into the house, and took his seat
at the table, where he fell to, at what was set before him, with a
laudable dispatch.

"How far off," he inquired, "is the nearest Tory post, Mr. Musgrove?"

"Colonel Innis has some light corps stationed within two miles. If you
had been a little earlier you would have found some of them at my mill."

"Innis!" repeated Horse Shoe, "I thought Floyd had these parts under
command?"

"So he has," replied the miller, "but he has lately joined the garrison
at Rocky Mount."

"Ha! ha! ha!" ejaculated Robinson, "that's a pot into which Sumpter will
be dipping his ladle before long. All the l