"Who are these men coming into the road just ahead of us?" asked Major Gadbury, pointing to three men who were making their way through the field to the road. "The fire on the hill don't give quite light enough to enable me to make them out; but I suppose they are ruffians who have made their way from the new road."
"I don't know what they are, but we will go and see;" and they rode forward about a dozen rods to the point where the men were emerging from the field. "Who goes there?" demanded Colonel Belthorpe.
"Is that you, Mars'r Cunnel?" asked one of them.
"Uncle Dave!" exclaimed the planter.
"That's the parson," added Colonel Cosgrove.
"What are you doing over here, Uncle?" asked the commander.
"We done have nothin' more to do over yonder," replied the preacher. "The boys are all movin' over this way."
"But where are the ruffians that retreated from the new road?"
"The boys fell upon 'em and drove 'em over to the west, sar," the parson explained. "We don't kill any of 'em; but we bang 'em so they hold still on the ground. We think they was comin' over here to help the ruffians on this side, and we come over to 'tend to 'em."
"All right, venerable Uncle," laughed the colonel. "But can you tell me what is going on upon the hill yonder?"