contractor at the shanties of the construction gang, and slept by
his bed, and followed at his heel, and lived on the glance of his eye.

He was off again, the dog fairly winging his way to match his master's
speed. Hoxer could not kill him here, for the carcass would tell the
story. But was it not told already in those tracks in the dusty road?
What vengeance was there not written in the eccentric script of those
queer little padded imprints of the creature's paws. Fie, fool! Was this
the only cur-dog in the Bend? he asked himself, impatient of his fears.
Was not the whole neighborhood swarming with canine dependents?

Despite his reasoning, this endowment that was once himself had been
affrighted by the shock. The presence of the little cur-dog had
destroyed the complacence of his boasted ratiocination. He had only the
instincts of flight as he struck off through the woods when the 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 tha