Not long tarrying did our fugitives make, though perfectly safe from detection by the distance and their shaded position, for many a winding vale and wood-crowned height lay between them and the encampment.
But fear is not subject to the control of reason, and in the present instance it invested the dreaded Indians with superhuman powers of sight and of motion.

A few minutes' hasty flight brought our travellers to the brow of a precipitous bank, nearly a hundred feet above the level open plain which they sought.

Here, then, they felt comparatively safe: they were out of sight of the camp fires, the spot they had chosen was open, and flight, in case of the approach of the Indians, not difficult, while hiding-places were easy of access.

They found a deep, sheltered hollow in the bank, where two mighty pines had beep torn up by the roots, and prostrated headlong down the steep, forming a regular cave, roofed by the earth and fibres that had been uplifted in their fall.

Pendent from these roots hung a luxuriant curtain of wild grapevines and other creepers, which formed a leafy screen, through which the most curious eye could scarcely penetrate.