But again came the cry of the horse from afar, and Gibbie, this time recognizing the voice as Snowball's, forgot the rest.

He stood up on the very top of the rick and sent his keen glance round on all sides.

The cry came again and again, so that he was satisfied in what direction he must look.

The rain had abated a little, but the air was so thick with vapour that he could not tell whether it was really an object he seemed to see white against the brown water, far away to the left, or a fancy of his excited hope: it might be Snowball on the turn-pike road, which thereabout ran along the top of a high embankment.

He tumbled from the rick, rolled the line about the barrel, and pushed vigorously for what might be the horse.
It took him a weary hour--in so many currents was he caught, one after the other, all straining to carry him far below the object he wanted to reach: an object it plainly was before he had got half-way across, and by and by as plainly it was Snowball--testified to ears and eyes together.