Page:Eminent Authors of Contemporary Japan.pdf/111



Khashoji, a Chinese cavalryman, throwing aside his sabre, clung to the head of his horse in panic. He was sure that his neck had been badly slashed. He remembered having been struck with something, and at the same time he had frantically clung to his horse’s neck. The animal may also have been wounded, for the very moment when Khashoji bent his body upon his saddle, the animal gave a loud neigh, tossed its muzzle in the air, and immediately charged into the centre of the enemy’s cavalry, and began to gallop furiously across the wide Manchurian high-growing millet-fields. A few gun-shots came from behind, but Khashoji seemed to hear them as in a dream.

The millet-stalks, which were taller than a man, were trampled down by the madly-galloping horse, and as he rushed through them, they rose and fell like the waves of an angry sea. From right and left they swept Khashoji’s pig-tail from side to side. They struck his uniform, and smeared him with the dark-red blood which ran from his neck. But his brain was too confused to notice these things clearly. Only the simple fact that he had been wounded was branded upon his. consciousness with a terrible certainty. “I’m wounded! I’m wounded!” he repeated mechanically over and over