horse. As far as we could distinguish
through the rapidly-increasing gloom, he was a middle-aged man, bony and
long-legged, with a sallow unprepossessing physiognomy surmounting his
long ungainly carcass, and metal buttons upon his coat.

"And so you've lost your way?" said the stranger after a long pause,
during which the thick fog had had the kindness to convert itself into a
close penetrating rain. "That's queer too, seein' that the ferry ain't
fifteen paces from the road, which runs right along the side of the
river. A very queer mistake to be goin' up the stream, instead of
followin' yer nose and the run of the water."

"What do you mean?" cried Richards and I in a breath.

"That you're goin' up the Tennessee instead of down it, and are on the
road to Bainbridge. That's all!" replied the supposed Yankee.

"On the road to Bainbridge!" repeated we, in voices in which
astonishment and vexation were tolerably evident.

"You hadn't a mind to go to Bainbridge, then?"

"How far is the infernal place from here?" asked I.

"How far, how far?" repeated the man with the metal buttons. "It's not
to say very far, nor yet so very near, as I may guess. Perhaps you know
Squire Dimple?"

"I wish you and Squire Dimple were at the devil!" muttered I. But
Richards, who took things more quietly, replied--

"No, we have not the honour of his acquaintance."

"Humph! And whereaway may you be goin'?" enquired our tormentor, who was
apparently waterproof.

"To Florence in Alabama," answered Richards, "and thence down the
Mississippi."

"Ah, fine city, Florence! such as one only finds in this country. Ain't
it now? And a good market, too. Talkin' of that, what's the price of
flour in the north? You're come from thereaway, I guess. I did hear it
was six and four levies, and Injun corn five and a fip--butter three
fips."

"Are you mad?" cried I, losing all patience, and unconsciously raising
my whip as I spoke--"are you stark staring mad, to keep us talking here
about flour and butter, and fips and levies, while the rain is falling
by bucketsfull?"

"Hallo, stranger!" cried the man, raising himself for the first time out
of his lounging position on the saddle. "Guess you're gettin' wolfish.
I'm for you--stick, fist, or whiphandle, rifle or bowie-knife. Should
like to see the man as could leather Isaac Shifty!"

"The road, the road, Mister Isaac Shifty!" interrupted friend Richards
in a conciliating tone. There was another lo