He had entered upon the trace through a thick wood, when the
sound of other hoofs came down upon the wind; not to his ears, for,
swallowed up in his own meditations, his senses had lost much of their
wonted acuteness. He had not been long gone from the point of the road
in which we found him, when his place upon the same route was supplied
by the pursuing party, Rivers and Munro. They were both admirably
mounted, and seemed little to regard, in their manner of using them, the
value of the good beasts which they bestrode--driving them as they did,
resolutely over fallen trees and jutting rocks, their sides already
dashed with foam, and the flanks bloody with the repeated application of
the rowel. It was soon evident that farther pursuit at such a rate would
be impossible: and Munro, as well for the protection of the horses, as
with a knowledge of this necessity, insisted upon a more moderated and
measured pace.
Much against his own will, Rivers assented, though his impatience
frequent found utterance in words querulously sarcastic.
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