Riding slowly along through the dense forest, wondering if I dared treat myself to a smoke, I turned full on a group of four men, in dirty butternut, camped in a laurel brake. They were chivalrous Southerners without doubt, but built on the plan of "He who fights and runs away." They evidently thought they had been discovered by Yankees and that the proper time to run had arrived. One man, who was lifting a bucket of coffee from the coals, ejaculated "hell," and taking the bucket with him, fled, followed by the others.
To my startled gaze they seemed to disappear in a dozen different directions at the same time. I would have been extremely grateful to the leader if he had left the coffee behind.
Knowing that a short stop made by me might be lengthened out indefinitely if any of the fugitives chanced to return, I departed without much delay. As soon as I reached the road I turned into it and had a comparatively easy time for the next few miles.
CHAPTER V.
I was so weary and worn out by my constant riding and so in need of sleep that it was only by determined effort that I could keep my eyes open. Several times I roused to the unpleasant conviction that I had been asleep in my saddle. I knew that would not do, for I well knew that even in that seemingly quiet district constant watchfulness was needed and that later on fresh dangers would need freshened faculties and renewed energy to meet them. So I decided to allow myself an hour's rest.
As quick as I found a suitable place, which I soon did in the shape of a narrow, rock-hung ravine, which branched off at my right hand between two almost perpendicular walls of mountains, I stopped, and dismounting, led my horse in after me. When we had penetrated several rods I tethered my horse behind some bushes, so that he could graze, and crawled into a leaf cushioned hole between two rocks.
I have always had the faculty of waking at any predetermined time, and when I roused from a heavy sleep of exhaustion I had exceeded my hour's allowance by only ten minutes.