and clatter of the hoofs grew nearer.
I heard the panting of the horse, and the fellow shouted some threat at
me. There was a turn in the lane, and as I rounded it I drew up my white
Arab on his haunches. As we spun round I met the Prussian Hussar face to
face. He was going too fast to stop, and his only chance was to ride me
down. Had he done so he might have met his own death, but he would have
injured me or my horse past all hope of escape. But the fool flinched as
he saw me waiting and flew past me on my right. I lunged over my Arab's
neck and buried my toy sword in his side. It must have been the finest
steel and as sharp as a razor, for I hardly felt it enter, and yet his
blood was within three inches of the hilt. His horse galloped on and he
kept his saddle for a hundred yards before he sank down with his face on
the mane and then dived over the side of the neck on to the road. For my
own part I was already at his horse's heels. A few seconds had sufficed
for all that I have told.

I heard the cry of rage and vengeance which rose from the Prussians as
they passed their dead comrade, and I could not but smile as I wondered
what they could think of the Emperor as a horseman and a swordsman. I
glanced back cautiously as before, and I saw that none of the seven men
stopped. The fate of their comrade was nothing compared to the carrying
out of their mission.

They were as untiring and as remorseless as bloodhounds.

But I had a good lead and the brave Arab was still going well. I thought
that I was safe. And yet it was at that very instant that the most
terrible danger befell me. The lane divided, and I took the smaller of
the two divisions because it was the more grassy and the easier for the
horse's hoofs. Imagine my horror when, riding through a gate, I found
myself in a square of stables and farm-buildings, with no way out save
that by which I had come! Ah, my friends, if my hair is snowy white,
have I not had enough to make it so?

To retreat was impossible. I could hear the thunder of the Prussians'
hoofs in the lane. I looked round me, and Nature has blessed me with
that quick eye which is the first of gifts to any soldier, but most of
all to a leader of cavalry. Between a long, low line of stables and the
farm-house there was a pig-sty. Its front was made of bars of wood four
feet high; the back was of stone, higher than the front. What was beyond
I could not tell. The space between the front and the back w