Now, as we rode, from behind us the sound of bells came quavering across dim meadows; out of the blue night bells answered; we heard the reports of guns, the distant clamour of a horn blowing persistently from some hidden hamlet.
"The alarm!" panted Foxcroft, at my elbow, as we pounded on. "Hurrah! Hurrah! The country lives!"
"Jack!" I called, through the rushing wind, "the whole land is awaking behind us! Do you hear? Our country lives!"
"And England dies!" cried Mount, passionately. With both hands uplifted, and bridle flung across his horse's neck, he galloped in the lead. On his huge horse, towering up in the saddle, he swept on through the night, a gigantic incarnation of our people militant, a colossal shape embodying all that we had striven for and suffered for from the hour when the first pioneer died at the stake.
On he swept astride his rushing horse, the fox-tail on his cap streaming, the thrums on his sleeves blowing like ripe grain; and ever he tossed his arms towards the sky and shook his glittering rifle above his head, till the moonshine played on it like lightning.
"Ring! Ring out your bells!" we shouted, as we tore through a sleeping village; and behind us we could see candle-light break out from the dark houses, and, ere the volleying echoes of our horses' hoofs struck the last spark from the village streets, the meeting-house bell began swinging, warning the distant farms that the splendid hour had come.
And now, unexpectedly, we encountered a check in our course. Full in the yellow moonlight, on a little hill over which our road lay, we caught sight of a body of horsemen drawn up, and we knew, by the moon shining on their gorgets, that we had before us a company of dragoons with their officers.
At a word from Jack I dismounted and pulled the rails from the road fence on our right. Through the aperture we filed, out into a field of young winter wheat well sprouted, and then west, as quietly as we might, with watchful eyes on the dragoons.
But the British horsemen had also turned, and were now trotting along parallel to our course, which manœuvre drove us off eastward again across the meadows, deep starred with dandelions. For us to alarm Lexington was now impossible. We could already see the liberty-pole on the hill and make out where the village lay, by a gilt weather-vane shining in the moonlight above the trees. But there were no lights to be seen in Lexington, and we dared not ride through the dark town, not knowing but that it might be swarming with dragoons.
Still, if it were impossible for us to alarm Lexington, we could ride on across the fields and gain the Bedford Road.