I must indeed suppose that I did myself choose my path and guide in it the gallant little horse; but, were I to trust merely to the memory of feeling, I should believe that I sat in the saddle like one in a dream, while Charley, with the inward knowledge of some homing pigeon, galloped straight for the place where lay all my hopes and fears. 'T was but twice that I had any sight of my escort--first, turning in my seat as Charley reached the level of the meadow-land below the hill that falls away from the home paddock, I beheld them, close massed in a body, rounding the bend of the fence away to the right above me, and just about commencing the descent; and once again, after the roan had leaped into, and well-nigh miraculously scrambled out of, an ugly and broken gully that lies near half-way between Royston and my father's house. For as Charley heaved his body with a tearing, scratching, and clinging most wondrous cat-like upon the safe ground of the further bank, I looked back once more and spied them bearing off to the left for lower ground and easier passage; but by this they were a straggling rout covering much ground, so hardly already had the pace and distance with the differing weight of riders told upon the various mettle of the horses. Indeed, the next two miles did tell not a little even upon Charley, being a rising stretch of ploughed land in condition very grievous for his smallness of hoof; but coming thereafter to grass, he was mightily refreshed, and cleared two fences and a little bank of earth with bushes atop in his old gay and light-hearted manner. And after this we were not long in coming to the road, which being in good condition for the season and weather that it was we made the remaining miles at a very pretty pace.