Twilight had melted into darkness long before the rest of the party
arrived; then an hour or more was consumed in the last preparations and
refreshments. It was fully nine o'clock on the night of February 21st,
when we started from Symonds' door, strengthened for the journey with a
warm stirrup-cup, and warmer kind wishes from the family, including two
_very_ "sympathizing" damsels, who had come in from neighboring
homesteads to bid the Southward-bound good speed.
Before we had ridden a mile, the Marylanders turned off to a house where
they were to take up some letters, promising to rejoin us before we had
gone a league. But we traversed more than that distance, at the slowest
foot-pace, without being overtaken, and at length determined to wait for
the laggards, drawing back about thirty paces off the path, into a glade
where there was partial shelter from the icy wind that swept past, laden
with coming snow. There we tarried for a long half-hour (told on my
watch by a fusee-light), and still no signs of our companions. Symonds
(the cousin), who abode with us still, began to mutter doubts, and the
Alabama man to grumble curses (he had ever a fatal facility in
blasphemy), and I own to having entertained divers disagreeable
misgivings, though I carefully avoided expressing them.
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