114 THE HORSE AND HIS RIDER 



' Punctual to the announced time the command- 

 ant, superior officers of the garrison, and some of 

 the civil authorities of Constantina rode across the 

 course and took up their position opposite the stand. 

 With them came a body of Arab grandees of suffi- 

 cient importance to be admitted within the sacred 

 circle : imposing figures in burnouses of every colour 

 — white, black, blue, scarlet, puce — and some of 

 them — magnates from the Sahara these — in enor- 

 mous straw hats, three or four feet in diameter, 

 covered with black ostrich feathers, and screening 

 the head and shoulders as completely as an umbrella. 

 Thanks to French organisation, there was no time 

 lost in clearing the course — it had been kept clear 

 the whole time : even the usual dog had not been 

 allowed to set foot on it ; and immediately on the 

 arrival of the great people the starters for the first 

 race took their places at the post. They were five 

 Arabs of the ordinary stamp ; four of them dappled 

 or silver-gray, the fifth dark bay. To an eye accus- 

 tomed to European horseflesh they would have looked, 

 perhaps, at the first glance like a lot of screws ; 

 but when you came to examine them closely you 

 found undeniable points about them, and a look of 

 gameness that showed it was at any rate no plebeian 

 animal you had before you. If the horses were un- 

 like what one sees on an English course, the riders 

 where still more so. Most of them were bareheaded 

 and barefooted, and had nothing on except a shirt 



