determined manner as before. "I care not for your abusive epithets,
and have only to say of them, that they are worthy of the source from
which they proceed. But you have knowingly and wickedly defrauded me
of my farm; unless I obtain redress, as I little expect, from a court
which seems so easily to see merits in a rich man's claim. Yes, you
have defrauded me, sir, out of my hard-earned farm; and there," he
continued, pointing to his gasping horse,--"there lies nearly half of
all my remaining property--dead and gone! ay, and by your act, which,
from signs I had previously noticed, and from the tones of that young
lady's exclamation at the instant, (and God bless her for a heart
which could be kind in such company,) I shall always believe was
wilfully committed. And if I can make good my suspicions and a court
of law will not give me justice, I will have it elsewhere! There, sir,
go," he added, relinquishing his hold on the horse, and stepping
aside,--"go! but remember I claim a future reckoning at your hands!"

The sleigh now passed on to the yard of the inn, where the company
alighted, and soon disappeared within its doors, leaving the young man
standing alone in the road, gazing after them with that moody and
disquieted kind of countenance which usually settles on the face on
the subsidence of a strong gust of passion.

"Poor pony!" he at length muttered, sadly, as, rousing himself, he now
turned towards his petted beast, that lay dead in his rude
harness,--"poor pony! But there is no help for you now, nor for me
either, I fear, as illy as I can afford to lose you. But it is not so
much the loss, as the manner--the manner!" he repeated, bitterly, as
he proceeded to undo the fastenings of the tackle, with the view of
removing the carcass and the broken sleigh from the road.