that
he was in a wild empire of the forest--a wilderness--and that the sun
was rapidly approaching his setting. The bridle held heedlessly, lay
loose upon the neck of his steed; and it was only when the noble animal,
more solicitous about his night's lodging than his rider, or rendered
anxious by his seeming stupor, suddenly came to a full stand in the
narrow pathway, that the youth seemed to grow conscious of his doubtful
situation, and appeared to shake off his apathy and to look about him.

He now perceived that he had lost the little Indian pathway which he had
so long pursued. There was no sign of route or road on any side. The
prospect was greatly narrowed; he was in a valley, and the trees had
suddenly thickened around him. Certain hills, which his eyes had
hitherto noted on the right, had disappeared wholly from sight. He had
evidently deflected greatly from his proper course, and the horizon was
now too circumscribed to permit him to distinguish any of those guiding
signs upon which he had relied for his progress. From a bald tract he
had unwittingly passed into the mazes of a somewhat thickly-growing
wood.

"Old Blucher," he said, addressing his horse, and speaking in clear
silvery tones--"what have you done, old fellow? Whither have you brought
us?"

The philosophy which tells us, when lost, to give the reins to the
steed, will avail but little in a region where the horse has never been
before. This our traveller seemed very well to know. But the blame was
not chargeable upon Blucher. He had tacitly appealed to the beast for
his direction when suffering the bridle to fall upon his neck. He was
not willing, now, to accord to him a farther discretion; and was quite
too much of the man to forbear any longer the proper exercise of his own
faculties. With the quickening intelligence in his eyes, and the
compression of his lips, declaring a resolute will, he pricked the
animal forward, no longer giving way to those brown musings, which,
during the previous hour, had not only taken him to remote regions but
very much out of his way besides. In sober earnest, he had lost the way,
and, in sober earnest, he set about to recover it; but a ten minutes'
farther ride only led him to farther involvements; and he paused, for a
moment, to hold tacit counsel with his steed, whose behavior was very
much that of one who understands fully his own, and the predicament of
his master. Our traveller then dismounted, and, suffering