wood-lot.  Nothing was further from Sam’s mind than to have any one of the troop taken until such season as should seem to him most befitting,—­and the exertions that he made were certainly most heroic.  Like the sword of Coeur De Lion, which always blazed in the front and thickest of the battle, Sam’s palm-leaf was to be seen everywhere when there was the least danger that a horse could be caught; there he would bear down full tilt, shouting, “Now for it! cotch him! cotch him!” in a way that would set everything to indiscriminate rout in a moment.

Haley ran up and down, and cursed and swore and stamped miscellaneously.  Mr. Shelby in vain tried to shout directions from the balcony, and Mrs. Shelby from her chamber window alternately laughed and wondered,—­not without some inkling of what lay at the bottom of all this confusion.

At last, about twelve o’clock, Sam appeared triumphant, mounted on Jerry, with Haley’s horse by his side, reeking with sweat, but with flashing eyes and dilated nostrils, showing that the spirit of freedom had not yet entirely subsided.

“He’s cotched!” he exclaimed, triumphantly.  “If ’t hadn’t been for me, they might a bust themselves, all on ’em; but I cotched him!”

“You!” growled Haley, in no amiable mood.  “If it hadn’t been for you, this never would have happened.”

“Lord bless us, Mas’r,” said Sam, in a tone of the deepest concern, “and me that has been racin’ and chasin’ till the sweat jest pours off me!”

“Well, well!” said Haley, “you’ve lost me near three hours, with your cursed nonsense.  Now let’s be off, and have no more fooling.”

“Why, Mas’r,” said Sam, in a deprecating tone, “I believe you mean to kill us all clar, horses and all.  Here we are all just ready to drop down, and the critters all in a reek of sweat.  Why, Mas’r won’t think of startin’ on now till arter dinner.  Mas’rs’ hoss wants rubben down; see how he splashed hisself; and Jerry limps too; don’t think Missis would be willin’ to have us start dis yer way, no how.  Lord bless you, Mas’r, we can ketch up, if we do stop.  Lizy never was no great of a walker.”

Mrs. Shelby, who, greatly to her amusement, had overheard this conversation from the verandah, now resolved to do her part.  She came forward, and, courteously expressing her concern for Haley’s accident, pressed him to stay to dinner, saying that the cook should bring it on the table immediately.

Thus, all things considered, Haley, with rather an equivocal grace, proceeded to the parlor, while Sam, rolling his eyes after him with unutterable meaning, proceeded gravely with the horses to the stable-yard.

“Did yer see him, Andy? did yer see him?” said Sam, when he had got fairly beyond the shelter of the barn, and fastened the horse to a post.  “O, Lor, if it warn’t as good as a meetin’, now, to see him a dancin’ and kickin’ and swarin’ at us.  Didn’t I hear him?  Swar away, ole fellow (says I to myself ); will yer have yer hoss now, or wait till you cotch him? (says I).  Lor, Andy, I think I can see him now.”  And Sam and Andy leaned up against the barn and laughed to their hearts’ content.