of horse-hoofs announced that some one approached.

Presently up rode the quondam farmer and Mountain Hermit, now revealed in his true character as a partisan leader, and followed by several men in green uniforms, wearing the brass and bear-skin helmets of a well-known Tory corps, called after their leader the “Johnson Greens” or “Rangers.”

The spy was dressed as before in homespun clothes, but he rode a stout horse, and wore a sword, while he seemed to be in authority over white and red alike.

He issued a few brief orders, after which he dismounted from his horse, and the rangers and Indians proceeded to encamp.

It was not long before a fierce fire was glowing under the arches of the woods, the heat being very grateful to the frame of the captive hussar, for the night was chilly, and he was wet and shivering, from wading so many brooks.

He had sunk down at the foot of a tree, quite tired out, when a ranger stirred him up with the butt end of his rifle,[Pg 29] and ordered him, in a surly tone, to “get up, the captain wanted to see him.”

[Pg 29]

Schuyler obeyed the ungracious order with patience, for he knew the hands he had fallen into, and did not wish to provoke further indignities. He followed the soldier to where his late enemy lay under a tree, with his feet to the fire, gloomily meditating.

The partisan looked up, and a grim smile lighted his face.

“So, my young hussar, the tables are turned, it seems. It takes an old warrior to keep Tony Butler in irons. Now, hand out your dispatches, unless you prefer to be searched. Which shall it be?”

The young officer smiled disdainfully.

“My dispatches are in my brain,” he said. “All I carry in writing is this.”

And he drew a paper from his bosom and handed it to the captain of rangers.

CHAPTER VI.

A DEMONIACAL VISIT.

Captain Butler, for such was the name by which the partisan seemed to be known, took the parchment extended by the prisoner, and examined it closely.

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