red idly
whether I had over-eaten myself at my last meal. Then the thing passed
for awhile from my mind, which the descent of a steep hill sufficiently
occupied.

But a few minutes later, happening to turn in the saddle, I experienced
a strange and sudden dizziness; so excessive as to force me to grasp the
cantle, and cling to it, while trees and hills appeared to dance round
me. A quick, hot pain in the side followed, almost before I recovered
the power of thought; and this increased so rapidly, and was from the
first so definite, that, with a dreadful apprehension already formed
in my mind, I thrust my hand inside my clothes, and found that swelling
which is the most sure and deadly symptom of the plague.

The horror of that moment--in which I saw all those things on the
possession of which I had just been congratulating myself, pass
hopelessly from me, leaving me in dreadful gloom--I will not attempt to
describe in this place. Let it suffice that the world lost in a moment
its joyousness, the sunshine its warmth. The greenness and beauty round
me, which an instant before had filled me with pleasure, seemed on a
sudden no more than a grim and cruel jest at my expense, and I an atom
perishing unmarked and unnoticed. Yes, an atom, a mote; the bitterness
of that feeling I well remember. Then, in no long time--being a
soldier--I recovered my coolness, and, retaining the power to think,
decided what it behoved me to do.

CHAPTER XXXI. UNDER THE GREENWOOD.

To escape from my companions on some pretext, which should enable me to
ensure their safety without arousing their fears, was the one thought
which possessed me on the subsidence of my first alarm. Probably it
answered to that instinct in animals which bids them get away alone when
wounded or attacked by disease; and with me it had the fuller play as
the pain prevailed rather by paroxysms, than in permanence, and, coming
and going, allowed intervals of ease, in which I was able to think
clearly and consecutively, and even to sit firmly in the saddle.

The moment one of these intervals enabled me to control myself, I used
it to think where I might go without danger to others; and at once and
naturally my thoughts turned to the last place we had passed; which
happened to be the house in the gorge where we had received news of
Bruhl's divergence from the road. The man who lived there alone had had
the plague; therefore he did not fear it. The place itself was solit