The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1855-02-15
FOR THE NATIONAL ERA.
SHERWOOD FOREST,
W AGER BY BATTLE.
Tale Of Saxon Slavery in the Twelfth Century
BY HENRY WILLIAM HERBERT.
CHAP. XE-Coucluded

The party which had taken the sands at the
most northern point had now so far overreach-
ed upon the fugitive, that he had no longer a
chance of crossing the course of the Kent in
advance of them. If he persisted in his course,
ten minutes more would have placed him un-
der the counters Of their horses and tho point
of their lances. The other body, who had fol.
lowed him directly, had already perceived their
danger, had pulled up, and were rctracIug their
steps slowly, trying to pick their way through
the driest ground, and, coasting up and down
the side of the Beetham water, were endeavor-
ing to find ford passable for their heavy
horses. Lower down the bay, by mile or two,
they were the first to be overtaken, the sands
were already all ahoat, ell treacherous ooze,
around thsm the banks, dry places there were
no longer any, were not to be distinguished
from the channels of the rivers.
Suddenly, seeing himself cut off, blinded by
his immediate terrors, and thinking only to
avoid the more instant peril, Eadwulf turned
southwark; turned toward the pillows, which
we're now coming in, six feet abreast, not two
miles below him, tossing their foamy crests like
the name of the pale horse of the Apocalypse,
with a sound deeper and more appalling than
the roar of the fercest thunder. He saw the
hopelessness of his position and, at the same
moment, the first horror of their situation
dawned on the souls of his savage pursuers.
In that one glance, all was revealed to them ;
every thought, every incident, every action of
their past lives, flashed before the eyes of their
mind, as if reflected in a mirror and then all
was blank.
Every rein was drawn simultaneously, every
horse halted where he stood, almost belly deep
in the sands, snorting and painting, blown and
dead beat by that fruitless gallop; and now
the soil, everywhere beneath them and about
them, was melting away into briny ooze, with
Shiny worms and small cells and lampreys wrig-
CLING obscenely, where little while before, the
heaviest war horse might have paved long and
deep without finding water and the waves were
gaining on them, with more than the speed of
charging cavalry, and the nearest shore was
five miles distant.
Within furlong, on a solitary black stone,
which might perhaps overtop the entering food
for an hours space or better, lay Eadwulf the
serf. Utterly beaten, unable to move hand or
foot, unable even to raise his head, or look the
coming death in the face, where he had fallen,
there he lay.
Two minutes, and the farthest of those horse
men might have taken him, might have speared
him, where he lay, unresisting, unbeseeching.
But none thought of him, none thought of any
thing, but the seattle sea.
They paused for an instant to breathe their
horses, before turning to ride that desperate
race-but in that instant they saw such sight
as chilled their very blood. The other party
which had now retreated before the tide to
within mile of them to the eastward, had now
determined, as it seemed, at all risks. to force
their way back through the channel of the Bee
than water and entered it one by one, in sin
gle file, the unarmed guide leading, and the
mail-clad rider bringing up the rear. Each sf
ter each, lower they sank and lower, their
horses struggling and rolling in the surge.
Now their croupes, now their withers diaap-
peared from the eyes Of the beholders now the
necks only of the horses and the bodies of the
riders were visible above the wash. A moment
of suspense, almost intolerable, for every one
of those mute gazers felt that he was looking
on the counterpart and perfect picture of what
must in a few minutes, more or less, be his own
fate also! A moment, and the guides horse
struggled upward, his withers reappeared, his
croupe-he had cleared the channel, he was
safe. A light page followed him, with the like
success two halfarmed troopers followed; al.
ready, presaging safety, shout of exultation
trembed on the lips of the spectators, when the
mail-clad rider on his heavy horse reached the
mid passage-reached the spot where his horse
should have gradually emerged-then in an IN
slant, in the twinkling Of an eye, before one
couiu breathe slgn VI syliapie, last - GCd
save him he sank, sheer and sudden, as if
the bottom had yawned under him, and with
out an effort, cry, struggle, was sucked an
der.
He was there--he was gone; never moro to
be seen, above the face of the waters. At Che
same instant, just as they uttered one wild cry
of horror and despair, or ere they could turn
their horses heads landward deep, cold, wet
wind breathed upon them; gray mist swept
down on them, outrunning the trampling squad
rons of the foamy waves; fierce hail storm
smote them; and, in an instant, everything
shores, pillows, skies-evanished from them.
wrapped in utter gloom. Then they dispersed,
each struggling through the rapidly mounting
waters in that direction which he fancisd in his
blindness should be shoreward. No one of them
met other, more, in this world.