noon
Colonel Davie had given me bite and sup , and I was ready to take the road . My plan , such as it was , had been determined upon , and to the furthering of it , the colonel had written me a letter to a friend in the town who might shelter me for a night and make the needed inquiry for my belongings . Also , he had given me another letter , of which more anon , and had pressed upon me a small purse of gold pieces -- a treasure rare enough in patriot hands in that impoverished time . When all was done , two of my late captors were ordered to set me straight in the road ; and some half-hour past noon I had shaken hands with the big fellow in homespun who had been so bent upon hanging me without benefit of clergy , had crossed the river , and was making the first looping in a detour which should bring me into Charlotte from the westward . 'T was drawing on toward evening , and I had recrossed the river a mile or more below Appleby Hundred , when I began to meet the outposts of the British army . I was promptly halted by the first of these ; but my borrowed uniform and a ready word or two passed me within the lines as a courier riding post to headquarters from Major Ferguson in the west . The lieutenant in command of the first vedette line was not over-curious .