Trooper Tales — page 234: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

218 The Story of a Cavalry Horse. gelding. Like every other troop-horse, Sheridan’s nerves thrilled when the “dash” music burst with a scream from the trumpet. “Trot,” calls the troop commander. The bugle re- peats it. A hundred dusty campaign hats are jerked roughly downward. A hundred horses feel a tightening bit. “Sherry” rears a little, but does not mar the beauty of the line. “Gallop,” the bugle plays. The horses plunge high in the ecstacy of anticipation. There is fiery crimson in every wide-stretched nostril. Every trooper’s face is covered with dust and moisture. Every trooper’s jaws are shut like a vise, and every bridle-arm is as stiff as ~ steel. “Draw! Saber!’ Listen to the rattle of a hundred lightened sheaths. Watch the sweep of a hundred flash- ing blades. The sun is playing with the sabers. The points are held forward, shoulder high and horizontal. “Charge!” Like an engine answers to an open throt- tle, the horses settle down. Flank to flank they leap for- ward. Madly the men yell. Stirrup touches stirrup. A dust cloud follows. | “As fast as the slowest horse,” the officers have often warned. There is no slowest horse! It is a race—a wild, strain- _° ing, exhilarating race. The horses bound low. The men feel under them a moveless saddle. Not ahead mars the symmetry of the line. It is beautiful, with an awful beauty—this American cavalry dash! Eomichbooks (E()