This he soon effected, and he was straining every nerve to
gain the wood itself, when several horsemen rode by him
but a short distance on his left, and cut him off from this
place of refuge. The peddler threw himself on the ground
as they came near him, and was passed unseen. But delay,
now, became too dangerous for him to remain in that posi-
tion. He accordingly arose, and still keeping in the shad-
ow of the wood, along the skirts of which he heard voices
crying to each other to be watchful, he ran with incredible
speed in a parallel line, but in an opposite direction, to the
march of the dragoons.
The confusion of the chase had been heard by the whole
of the men, though none distinctly understood the order of
Lawton but those who followed. The remainder were lost
9



I30 THE SPY.
in doubt as to the duty that was required of them ; and the
aforesaid comet was making eager inquiries of the trooper
near him on the subject, when a man, at a short distance in
his rear, crossed the road at a single bound. At the same
instant, the stentorian voice of Lawton rang through the
valley, shouting:

" Harvey Birch — take him, dead or alive!"

Fifty pistols lighted the scene, and the bullets whistled
in every direction round the head of the devoted peddler.
