I moved along on a good fast trot, occasionally looking back to see if I was pursued. I had made about four miles, when, on looking back, I saw a squad of fifteen or sixteen cavalry in full chase after me. My sudden departure had excited their suspicions. I put the spurs to my mule and dashed ahead at the top of its speed. My pursuers gained on me. I urged my mule still harder, and still they continued to gain. My situation seemed a hopeless one. I could not outstrip them in the chase, and they were rapidly gaining on me. If captured, my flight under the circumstances would be conclusive evidence against me. Still, on I pressed, the distance between myself and pursuers growing rapidly less. My mule, too, was becoming exhausted, and my pursuers were within five hundred yards of me. I had come full three miles since I saw them giving chase. Passing a bend in the road, with a growth of small trees and brush along the fence that hid me from view, I came to a gap in the fence, through which I passed into a field. The field was covered with stubble and tall weeds. I dashed ahead at right angles with the road for about two hundred yards, when I entered a basin or depression in the surface of the ground, that in a wet time would have been a pond, but at that time it was dry. The ground was considerably lower than the surface of the field between the basin and the road. There I dismounted and sat down, and, in an instant more, I heard the tramp of horses as my pursuers passed on. I had despaired of making my escape, but as my pursuers passed on, hope began to revive. It was then about sundown. I waited there until dark, and then mounted my mule and started on. I knew that my pursuers would soon return, and I must manage so as not to be seen. When I arrived at the place where the road turns off to the right, that goes to Davis' Mills, I turned to the left into the edge of a piece of woods, where I could see without being seen, and halted. In a few minutes I heard my pursuers approaching, who, when they came to the corners, took the road to Davis' Mills. I remained under cover of the woods until I thought all stragglers of the party, if there should be any, had passed, and then went on, watching carefully as I went.