The negro stooped and placed his ear to the ground. He had heard an express train at a long distance, and the sound he was hearing at intervals was something like that. But he knew it was twenty miles to the nearest railroad which carried a train which could travel fast enough to make a similar sound. He had also heard a wolf-pack coming through the forest on one occasion, and that _pad-pad-pad_ of their flying feet was not dissimilar in sound to what he was hearing. He was also familiar with the herds of wild hogs which infested the Little Moccasin, and when they were moving rapidly at a long distance the sound would be like the persistent thrumming he could dimly hear. “Whutever dat is, ’tain’t hittin’ de groun’ wid its foots,” he announced to himself, as he glanced up about him with fear-shot eyes. “Dis here nigger is gittin’ ready to vacate hisself from dis swamp.” He glanced up at the sky. It was as clear as a soap bubble. The haze of the evening was settling upon the tree-tops like a vail of purple and gold under the setting sun. He was looking for the signs of the sudden storms which blow in from the Gulf, and he sniffed the air for the odor of smoke from a forest fire. “’Tain’t no fire, an’ it ain’t no cycaloon storm,” he muttered. He turned and walked rapidly down the little foot-path, still listening, but now more interested in getting out of the darkening woods than in locating the source of the sound. Suddenly he heard the noise so loud and distinct that his next guess was nearer than he dreamed. “Dat’s a automobile engyne!” he chattered, the goose-flesh rising all over his body. Then he shook his head in mute denial of his assertion. The nearest public highroad was ten miles away. “Not even a skeart nigger preacher kin hear ten miles,” he muttered. “An’ nobody but de debbil could run a automobile in dese here woods whar dar ain’t no road!” The thought brought him to a quick halt. Suppose the devil were loose in these woods, riding around in a flivver or straddle of a motor-cycle, seeking whom he might devour? “I don’t crave to meet de debbil,” the colored clergyman murmured, as he reached up for his stove-pipe hat and grasped it firmly in his fingers. “I done slanderized the debbil too frequent in my sermonts!” He turned his face until his eyes looked straight into the face of the setting sun, and he began to leave the scenery of the swamp behind him. He did not run. No man can run as fast as the Rev. Vinegar Atts was traveling.