He hastened with all speed to escape from so
frightful a neighbourhood. His imagination was full of this new
horror; he saw an adder in every curling vine, and heard the tail of a
rattlesnake in every dry leaf that rustled.
At length he succeeded in scrambling to the summit of a precipice; but
it was covered by a dense forest. Wherever he could gain a look-out
between the trees, he saw that the coast rose in heights and cliffs,
one rising beyond another, until huge mountains overtopped the whole.
There were no signs of cultivation, nor any smoke curling amongst the
trees, to indicate a human residence. Every thing was wild and
solitary. As he was standing on the edge of a precipice that
overlooked a deep ravine fringed with trees, his feet detached a great
fragment of rock; it fell, crashing its way through the tree tops,
down into the chasm. A loud whoop, or rather yell, issued from the
bottom of the glen; the moment after, there was the report of a gun;
and a ball came whistling over his head, cutting the twigs and leaves,
and burying itself deep in the bark of a chestnut-tree.
Dolph did not wait for a second shot, but made a precipitate retreat;
fearing every moment to hear the enemy in pursuit.
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