"
With this injunction, Content and the stranger left Dudley to the practice
of his own devices, the former observing the precaution to speak aloud
while returning, in order that any listeners without might be led to
suppose the whole party had retired from the search, satisfied of its
fruitlessness.
In the mean time, the youth left nigh the postern set about the
accomplishment of the task he had undertaken, in sober earnest. Instead of
descending in a direct line to the palisadoes, he also ascended, and made
a circuit among the out-buildings on the margin of the acclivity. Then
bending so low as to blend his form with objects on the snow, he gained an
angle of the palisadoes, at a point remote from the spot he intended to
watch, and, as he hoped, aided by the darkness of the hour and the shadows
of the hill, completely protected from observation. When beneath the
palisadoes, the sentinel crouched to the earth, creeping with extreme
caution along the timber which bound their lower ends, until he found
himself arrived at a species of sentry-box that was erected for the very
purpose to which he now intended it should be applied.
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