A wind had sprung up from the westward, and the heavens were covered with heavy gray clouds, which drifted swiftly across, a crescent moon peeping fitfully from time to time between the rifts.

Even during these moments of brightness the road, shadowed as it was by heavy trees, was very dark, but when the light was shut off it was hard, but for the loom upon either side, to tell where it lay.

De Catinat at least found it so, and he peered anxiously over his horse's ears, and stooped his face to the mane in his efforts to see his way.
"What do you make of the road ?" he asked at last.
"It looks as if a good many carriage wheels had passed over it to-day." "What! _Mon Dieu!_ Do you mean to say that you can see carriage wheels there ?" "Certainly.

Why not ?" "Why, man, I cannot see the road at all." Amos Green laughed heartily.

"When you have travelled in the woods by night as often as I have," said he, "when to show a light may mean to lose your hair, one comes to learn to use one's eyes." "Then you had best ride on, and I shall keep just behind you.
So! _Hola!_ What is the matter now ?" There had been the sudden sharp snap of something breaking, and the American had reeled for an instant in the saddle.
"It's one of my stirrup leathers.