He soon saw two men in brown jeans riding mules, farmers perhaps, but
carrying rifles on their shoulders, and, drawing his horse behind a big
tree, he waited until they passed.

They rode on unseeing and he resumed his journey, to stop an hour later
and eat cold food, while he permitted his horse to graze in an opening.
He had seen only three houses, one a large colonial mansion, with the
smoke rising from several chimneys, and the others small log structures
inhabited by poor farmers, but nobody was at work in the fields.

When he resumed the journey he was thankful that he had kept to the woods
as a body of Confederate cavalry, coming out of a path from the north,
turned into the main road and advanced at a good pace toward Jackson.
They seemed to be in good spirits, as he could hear them talking and
laughing, but he was glad when they were out of sight as these
Southerners had keen eyes and a pair of them might have discerned him in
the brush.

He went deeper into the woods and made another long study of his map.
It seemed to him now that he knew every hill and lagoon and road and path,
and he resolved to ride a straight course through the forest. There
was a point, distinctly marked north of Jackson, where he was to find
Hertford if he arrived in time, or to wait for him if he got there ahead
of time, and he believed that with the aid of the map he could reach it
through the woods.

He rode now by the sun and he saw neither path nor fields. He was in the
deep wilderness once more. The mockingbirds sang around him again and
through the rifts in the leaves he saw the sailing hawks seeking their
prey. Three huge owls sitting in a row on a bough slept undisturbed