Guy Rivers | Page 9

the South,
terminating usually in a ride to a neighboring plantation, and pleasant
accommodations so long as the stranger might think proper to avail
himself of them.
If, on the other hand, the stranger was in reality the ruffian he
represented himself, he knew not how to account for his delay in the
assault--a delay, to the youth's mind, without an object--unless
attributable to a temper of mind like that of Robin Hood, and coupled
in the person before him, as in that of the renowned king of the outlaws,
with a peculiar freedom and generosity of habit, and a gallantry and
adroitness which, in a different field, had made him a knight worthy to
follow and fight for Baldwin and the Holy Cross. Our young traveller
was a romanticist, and all of these notions came severally into his
thoughts. Whatever might have been the motives of conduct in the
robber, who thus audaciously announced himself the member of a club
notorious on the frontiers of Georgia and among the Cherokees for its
daring outlawries, the youth determined to keep up the game so long as
it continued such. After a brief pause, he replied to the above
politely-expressed demand in the following language:--
"Your request, most unequivocal sir, would seem but reasonable; and
so considering it, I have bestowed due reflection upon it. Unhappily,
however, for the Pony Club and its worthy representative, I am quite
too poorly provided with worldly wealth at this moment to part with
much of it. A few shillings to procure you a cravat--such as you may
get of Kentucky manufacture--I should not object to. Beyond this,
however (and the difficulty grieves me sorely), I am so perfectly
incapacitated from doing anything, that I am almost persuaded, in order
to the bettering of my own condition, to pay the customary fees, and
applying to your honorable body for the privilege of membership,
procure those means of lavish generosity which my necessity, and not
my will, prevents me from bestowing upon you."

"A very pretty idea," returned he of the road; "and under such
circumstances, your jest about the cravat from Kentucky is by no
means wanting in proper application. But the fact is, our numbers are
just now complete--our ranks are full--and the candidates for the honor
are so numerous as to leave little chance for an applicant. You might be
compelled to wait a long season, unless the Georgia penitentiary and
Georgia guard shall create a vacancy in your behalf."
"Truly, the matter is of very serious regret," with an air of much
solemnity, replied the youth, who seemed admirably to have caught up
the spirit of the dialogue--"and it grieves me the more to know, that,
under this view of the case, I can no more satisfy you than I can serve
myself. It is quite unlucky that your influence is insufficient to procure
me admission into your fraternity; since it is impossible that I should
pay the turnpike, when the club itself, by refusing me membership, will
not permit me to acquire the means of doing so. So, as the woods grow
momently more dull and dark, and as I may have to ride far for a
supper, I am constrained, however unwilling to leave good company, to
wish you a fair evening, and a long swing of fortune, most worthy
knight of the highway, and trusty representative of the Pony Club."
With these words, the youth, gathering up the bridle of the horse, and
slightly touching him with the rowel, would have proceeded on his
course; but the position of the outlaw now underwent a corresponding
change, and, grasping the rein of the animal, he arrested his farther
progress.
"I am less willing to separate than yourself from good company, gentle
youth, as you may perceive; since I so carefully restrain you from a ride
over a road so perilous as this. You have spoken like a fair and able
scholar this afternoon; and talents, such as you possess, come too
seldom into our forests to suffer them, after so brief a sample, to leave
us so abruptly. You must come to terms with the turnpike."
"Take your hands from my horse, sirrah!" was the only response made
by the youth; his tone and manner corresponding with the change in the
situation of the parties. "I would not do you harm willingly; I want no
man's blood on my head; but my pistols, let me assure you, are much

more readily come at than my purse. Tempt me not to use them--stand
from the way."
"It may not be," replied the robber, with a composure and coolness that
underwent no change; "your threats affect me not. I have not taken my
place here without a perfect knowledge of all its dangers and