Sword and Pen: Ventures and Adventures of Willard GlazierOwens, John Algernon
History
Sword and Pen: Ventures and Adventures of Willard Glazier
Owens, John Algernon
Glazier, Willard W., 1841-1905; United States -- History -- Civil War, 1861-1865 -- Personal narratives
The enemy's camp, which upon closer inspection, turned out to be simply
the resting-place of a local patrol, unconnected with any regular
command, broke up early in the morning, and Glazier and his companion
once more had a clear road. Although hungry from long fasting, they ran
swiftly over the swampy ground, and felt so elated to find themselves
again in a state of freedom, that they laughed and joked like boys
released from school, and pushed on until the verge of an extensive
morass was reached and passed, and they found themselves in a section of
country well wooded and watered, the alternate hills and vales
presenting a pleasing variety to the eye.
[Illustration: Pursuit Of Knowledge Under Difficulties.]
There was here also a public road, but it would have been dangerous to
travel thereon, and they therefore strode on beneath the trees and
umbrageous undergrowth of the wood. Having had no breakfast,
"blueberries" were not precisely the diet they would have selected for
dinner, but as _necessitas non habet leges_, they quietly munched their
berries, and we may hope felt grateful that matters were no worse. After
a while they made a sudden detour, crossing the high-road, and by so
doing, again broke the trail. Next they came to a clearing, but the
sight of a planter leaning against a fence, soon sent them back to the
friendly shelter of the wood. Late in the afternoon they came to a large
plantation on the border of which was a copse, in which they lay down
and watched for the opportunity of communicating with some of the house
slaves. At the expiration of about an hour, a lady, probably the
mistress of the estate, passed within a few yards of them, accompanied
by a troupe of merry children. They however went on their way, utterly
unconscious of the close proximity of two terrible Yankees!
Here our fugitives remained quietly concealed until night, and then
cautiously crept away. They proceeded onward until they found themselves
near a junction of cross-roads. Arrived at this junction, matters looked
serious. Unlike mariners, they had no compass; unlike Indians, they were
inexpert at discerning a trail; and what was more appalling, they
distinctly saw reared up against the moonlit sky--a gallows! Our two
friends approached this object very cautiously. It was not an unusual
thing to hang spies, and not unfrequently those _mistaken_ for spies,
but to hang them on a regularly constructed gibbet was not usual; and
therefore while Lemon insisted that the black and skeleton-like object
that loomed against the horizon was a gallows, he still entertained some
doubt upon the subject, and determined to satisfy himself by a closer
inspection.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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