noon
Shamus mounted a second good horse , and spurred toward home . Often did he look back , but without seeing any cause for increased alarm . As yet , however , the road had been level and winding , and therefore could not allow him to span much of it at a glance . After noon it ascended a high and lengthened hill surrounded by wastes of bog . As he gained the summit of this hill , and again looked back , a horseman appeared , sweeping to its foot . Shamus galloped at full speed down the now quickly falling road ; then along its level continuation for about a mile ; and then up another eminence , more lengthened , though not so steep as the former ; and from it still he looked back , and caught the figure of the horseman breaking over the line of the hill he had passed . For hours such was the character of the chase , until the road narrowed and began to wind amid an uncultivated and uninhabited mountain wilderness .