He heard that I had been there and hurried back home before me and told the Deacon, who ordered him to take me on the next morning, strip off my clothes, drive down four stakes in the ground and fasten my limbs to them; then strike me five hundred lashes for going to the prayer meeting.

This was what distressed my poor companion.

She thought it was more than I could bear, and that it would be the death of me.

I concluded then to run away--but she thought they would catch me with the blood hounds by their taking my track.

But to avoid them I thought I would ride off on one of the Deacon's mules.