Fortunately, too, the Virginians were horsemen, man and horse one piece almost, New World centaurs.

They would follow the bridle-tracks that pierced to the hilly country, and beyond that they might yet make way through the primeval forest.

They would encounter dangers, but hardly the old perils of seacoast and foothills.

Different, indeed, is this adventure of the Governor of Virginia and his chosen band from the old push afoot into frowning hostile woods by the men of a hundred and odd years before! Spotswood rode westward with a company drawn largely from the colonial gentry, men young in body or in spirit, gay and adventurous.

The whole expedition was conceived and executed in a key both humorous and knightly.