At some distance away to his right it presented a
clean, vertical profile against a background of blue sky to a point half
the way down, and of distant hills hardly less blue, thence to the tops
of the trees at its base. Lifting his eyes to the dizzy altitude of its
summit, the officer saw an astonishing sight - a man on horseback riding
down into the valley through the air!
Straight upright sat the rider, in military fashion, with a firm seat in
the saddle, a strong clutch upon the rein to hold his charger from too
impetuous a plunge. From his bare head his long hair streamed upward,
waving like a plume. His hands were concealed in the cloud of the
horse's lifted mane. The animal's body was as level as if every
hoof-stroke encountered the resistant earth. Its motions were those of a
wild gallop, but even as the officer looked they ceased, with all the
legs thrown sharply forward as in the act of alighting from a leap. But
this was a flight!
Filled with amazement and terror by this apparition of a horseman in the
sky-half believing himself the chosen scribe of some new apocalypse, the
officer was overcome by the intensity of his emotions; his legs failed
him and he fell.
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