BEGGARS ON HORSEBACK. 29 



noblest compassion of our hearts was lavished 

 on ourselves. The Tommies certainly played 

 their part in the strife with ingenuity that, in 

 some degree, made up for the inadequacy of 

 their pigmy tails. They kicked flies off their 

 stomachs and shoulders as artlessly and easily 

 as dogs ; they bit their legs down to the pastern ; 

 they rubbed themselves against the delicious 

 angularities of the hold-alls ; they buried their 

 faces in our habits in a way that would have 

 been maddening, if it had not appealed so tor- 

 turingly to our pity. 



It was eight o'clock before we reached Cann- 

 office, and the brilliant sky of summer had lost 

 but little of its radiancy. We and the Tommies 

 had perceptibly lost ours, but still the thing was 

 done. We had passed from among the lumpy 

 green hills, and had, by slow ascent, reached 

 more open country, which had a tendency and 

 a meaning in its strong, large, upward curve. 

 Already the faint ridge of the mountains was 

 on the horizon, and the balm of the uplands was 



