unflinching pitch, Richard and I would go on while there was strength to
set one foot before the other. But for the old borderer and the Indian
there was no such bellows to blow the fire of perseverance. None the
less, these two did more than second us; they set the strenuous pace and
held us to it; the Catawba Spartan-proud and uncomplaining; the old
hunter no whit less tireless and enduring. At this far-distant day I can
close my eyes and see the gaunt, leather-clad figure of Ephraim Yeates,
striding on always in the lead and ever pressing forward, tough, wiry
and iron to endure, and yet withal so elastic that the shrewdest
discouragement served only to make him rebound and strike the harder.
Good stuff and true there was in that old man; and had Richard or I been
less determined, his fine and noble heroism in a cause which was not his
own would have shamed us into following where he led.

We had been ten days in this starving wilderness, driving onward at the
pace that kills and making the most of every hour of daylight, before
Yeates and the Indian began to give us hope that we were finally closing
in upon our quarry.

The dragging length of the chase grew upon two conditions. From the
beginning the kidnappers were able to increase their lead by stretching
out the days and borrowing from the nights; also, they were doubtless
well provisioned, and they had horses for the captives and their
impedimenta. But as for us, we could follow only while the daylight let
us see the trail; and though we ran well at first, the lack of proper
food soon took toll of speed.

So now, though the hoof prints grew hourly fresher, and we were at last
so close upon the heels of the kidnappers that their night camp-fires
were scarcely cold when we came upon them, we ran no longer--could