Page:Palo'mine (1925).pdf/233

 sprang lightly to Palo'mine's back, without even touching a stirrup. And they were off for Pine River, the Kentucky thoroughbred running in that long, swinging, easy gallop that eats up distance like the bounds of a greyhound.

The General sat his horse like a centaur, yet he rode with the ease of a cowboy. Palo'mine at once knew that he was being ridden by an experienced horseman. While as for the General, he had not been thirty seconds in the saddle when he saw that he was riding a wonderful horse. There was none of the jar that there usually is in a headlong gallop, but, merely a rhythmic motion which rose and fell as evenly as the swell of the ocean. From the ease of the movement they did not seem to be going very fast but the General noted with joy that the keen morning wind cut his face and sang in his ears. He had never in all his life seen, from the back of a horse, trees, fences and houses fly past in this manner. Pebbles and small stones flew from beneath the hoofs of the flying thoroughbred, while