In a tranquil little dell that had grown up to wild grass,
he came suddenly upon a horse feeding. It was Stackridge's useful nag,
which looked up from his lofty grove-shaded pasture with a low whinny of
recognition as Penn patted his neck and passed along.

A furlong or two farther on the well-known ravine opened,--dark, silent,
profound, with its shaggy sides, one in shadow and the other in the sun,
and its little embowered brook trickling far down there amid mossy
stones;--as lonesome, wild, and solitary as if no human eye had ever
beheld it before.

Penn glided over the ledges, and descended along the narrow shelf of
rock, behind the thickets that screened the entrance to the cave.
Sunlight, and mountain wind, and summer heat he left behind, and entered
the cool, still, gloomy abode.

Cudjo ran to the mouth of the cave to meet him. "Lef me frow dis yer
blanket ober your shoulders, while ye cool off; cotch yer de'f cold, if
ye don't. De ol' man's a 'speckin' ye."

Penn was relieved to learn that Mr. Villars had arrived in safety, and
gratified to find him lying comfortably on the bed conversing with Pomp.

"By the blessing of God, I am very well indeed, my dear Penn. These
excellent fellow-Christians have taken the best of care of me. The
atmosphere of the cave, which I thought at first chilly, I now find
deliciously pure and refreshing. And its gloom, you know, don't trouble
me," added the blind old man with a smile. "Have you had any more
trouble since Pomp left you?"

"No," said Penn; "thanks to him. Pomp, our friends want to see you and
thank you, and they have sent me to bring you to them."

The negro merely shrugged his shoulders, and smiled.

"What good der tanks do to we?" cried Cudjo. "Ain't one ob dem ar men
but what would been glad to hab us cotched and licked for runnin' away,
fur de 'xample to de tudder niggers."

"If that was true of them once, it is not now," said Penn. "Yet, Pomp,
if you feel that there is the least danger in going to them, do not go."

"Danger?" The negro's proud and lofty look showed what he thought of
that. "Cudjo, make Mr. Hapgood a cup of coffee; he looks tired. You have
had a hard time, I reckon, since you left us."

"Him stay wid us now till he chirk up again," said Cudjo, running to his
coffee-box. "Him and de ol' gemman stay--nobody else."

While the coffee was making, Penn, sitting on one of the stone blocks
which he had named giant's stools, repeated such parts