"Witch or devil, my boys, let us ketch her if we can," shouted another.--"Hurrah! hurrah!" "Hurrah! hurrah! hurrah!" re-echoed the others, burying their spurs in their horses' sides, and bending forward, and grinning with very eagerness. For several miles Morag kept the full distance she had at first gained on her pursuers, but having got into a road, fenced by a rough stone wall upon one side, and a broad and very deep ditch on the other, the troopers, if possible, doubled their speed, in the full conviction that they must now very soon come up with her, and capture her. Still Morag flew,--but as she every moment cast her eyes over one or other of her shoulders, she was terrified to see that the troopers were visibly gaining upon her. The road before her turned suddenly at an angle,--and she had no sooner doubled it, than, there, to her unspeakable horror--in the very midst of the way--stood Tom Dickenson, the dismounted dragoon from whom she had taken the very charger, called Canterbury, which she then rode. The time of the action of what followed was very brief. For an instant she reined up her horse till he was thrown back on his haunches.--Tom Dickenson's sword-blade glittered in the sun. "By the god of war, but I have you now!" cried he in a fury. The triumphant shouts of Morag's pursuers increased, as they neared her, and beheld the position in which she was now placed. No weapon had she, but the large pair of scissors that hung dangling from her side, in company with her pincushion. In desperation she grasped the sharp-pointed implement dagger fashion, and directed old Canterbury's head towards the ditch. Dickenson saw her intention, and wishing to counteract it, he rushed to the edge of the ditch. The hand of Morag which held the scissors descended on the flank of the horse, and in defiance of his master, who stood in his way, and the gleaming weapon with which he threatened him, old Canterbury, goaded by the pain of the sharp wound inflicted on him, sprang towards the leap with a wild energy, and despite of the cut, which deprived him of an ear, and sheared a large slice of the skin off one side of his neck, he plunged the unlucky Tom Dickenson backwards, swash into the water, and carried his burden fairly over the ditch.