“But who shall ride from his destiny?” saith the proverb.  The wing of the bird is no security against the shaft of the fowler, and the helmet and the shield keep not away the draught that is poisoned.  He who wears the greaves, the gorget, and the coat-of-mail, holds defiance to the storm of battle; but he drinks and dies in the hall of banqueting.  What matters it, too, though the eagle soars and screams among the clouds, halfway up to heaven—­flaunting his proud pinions, and glaring with audacious glance in the very eye of the sun—­death waits for him in the quiet of his own eyry, nestling with his brood.  These are the goodly texts of the Arabian sage, in whose garden-tree, so much was he the beloved of heaven, the birds came and nightly sang for him those solemn truths—­those lessons of a perfect wisdom—­which none but the favored of the Deity are ever permitted to hear.  They will find a sufficient commentary in the fortune of the rider whom we have just beheld setting out from his parting with his mistress, on his way of new adventure—­his heart comparatively light, and his spirit made buoyant with the throng of pleasant fancies which continually gathered in his thought.

The interview between Forrester and his mistress had been somewhat protracted, and his route from her residence to the road in which we find him, being somewhat circuitous, the night had waned considerably ere he had made much progress.  He now rode carelessly, as one who mused—­his horse, not urged by its rider, became somewhat careful of his vigor, and his gait was moderated much from that which had marked his outset.  He had entered upon the trace through a thick wood, when the sound of other hoofs came down upon the wind; not to his ears, for, swallowed up in his own meditations, his senses had lost much of their wonted acuteness.  He had not been long gone from the point of the road in which we found him, when his place upon the same route was supplied by the pursuing party, Rivers and Munro.  They were both admirably mounted, and seemed little to regard, in their manner of using them, the value of the good beasts which they bestrode—­driving them as they did, resolutely over fallen trees and jutting rocks, their sides already dashed with foam, and the flanks bloody with the repeated application of the rowel.  It was soon evident that farther pursuit at such a rate would be impossible:  and Munro, as well for the protection of the horses, as with a knowledge of this necessity, insisted upon a more moderated and measured pace.

Much against his own will, Rivers assented, though his impatience frequent found utterance in words querulously sarcastic.  The love of gain was a besetting sin of the landlord, and it was by this passion that his accomplice found it easy, on most occasions, to defeat the suggestions of his better judgment.  The tauntings of the former, therefore, were particularly bestowed upon this feature in his character, as he found himself compelled to yield to the requisition of the latter, with whom the value of the horses was no small consideration.