ed, we went
to inspect him. He was small, corpulent, and was sitting with clasped
woolly gloves, goloshed feet, and a diffident smile.

He explained to us that he was delicate, and as he was no walker it
would be necessary for him to ride one horse. So we packed our food,
sacks, blankets, mackintoshes and the card-house as best we could on the
remaining five horses.

No sooner had we left the village, and all signs of road or bridle path,
with a new policeman and two or three ragged Albanians, than one of the
horses broke loose and began to dance--first the tango, then the waltz.
The pack, which was but insecurely attached, stood the tango, but with
the waltz a bag of potatoes swung loose at the end of a rope, its
gyroscopic action swinging the horse quicker and quicker until it was
spinning on one toe. Then the girths broke, saddle and all came to the
ground. The brute looked round as if saying "That's that," and cantered
off, followed slowly by the professor on horseback. We called. He
appeared to take no notice. At last he turned round saying--

"The horse will not."

Jo leapt in the air kicking.

"Do that with your heels," she said.

But we had to send the policeman to help him. He rode hour by hour,
hitting his beast with a bent umbrella, and lifting two fat hands to
heaven.

"Teshko" (It is hard), he whined.

"_Ni_ je teshko" (It is not hard), said Miss Brindley, cheerfully
trudging along.

We wanted to stop at the top of a hill for lunch.

"Horrible," he said. "Here the brigands will shoot us from the bushes,"
and pushed ahead, being held on by the grinning policeman.

We pulled out some biscuits and margarine, and drank water from our
bottles, cigarettes went round, and we charged ahead. In front was the
professor falling off his horse and being put on again.

We were very anxious about the frontier. Most of our party were
travelling without official permits, as they had known nothing about
such things; but we hoped that being English Red Cross and having
passports there would not be much trouble. We arrived at a little
village, three or four wooden houses. Three pompous old men came to meet
us, and we took coffee together outside the inn. They were very
surprised to hear we were English, and said that no English had ever
passed that way before.

At the frontier, an hour further on, a man and his wife came down from a
little house on the hill and stopped us. They examined the papers of the
two