We visited the Commander-in-Chief, drank the necessary tea, and then I got home rather fatigued by the excitement and the exercise out of doors. I took off my furs and lit a pipe for a quiet evening, but had to go out again to see a Page boy who was very ill with fever.
I was on the watch that evening and the next morning to see if I should have any return of fever myself. As there was none, I had my horse saddled, and started, after breakfast, on a visit to the Hospital, where I had not been able to put in an appearance for several weeks.
I enjoyed being out on horseback again. I was riding a young horse that the Amîr had given me. He seemed to enjoy being out also, for presently he began to toss his head and snort and plunge.
The Armenian said, sagaciously,
“Sir, he very fool horse.”
The plunging was not sufficiently satisfying, and he commenced rearing and kicking. Unfortunately the fever, in addition to making my legs shaky, had taken a large slice off the normal amount of pluck that one ordinarily possesses, so that in proportion as his jubilation increased mine diminished.
The road was very lumpy and frozen hard, and it seemed to me that the “fool horse,” in his lunatic caperings, must inevitably slip down and break my leg. There was an evil time to come. We had got through the Bazaar without any serious mishap when, just outside, we happened to come alongside of another man on horseback. This was what my “fool horse” desired; the very thing he was waiting for—he always was a regular bulldog for worrying with his teeth, and was a ruffian at striking: up he reared and simply pounced on the other horse. He caught him by the neck and shook him, and drove him up against a wall. Both reared upright, and then commenced the screams and the strikings of two incensed stallions. The other man was even less happy than I, for my brute was getting the best of it. I wondered which of us would be killed, and began to think it would be the other man.
The Armenian shouted,
“Sir, please you hit him with spur.”
I hadn’t a spur to “hit” with, for, knowing the horse would be “fresh,” I had not put any on. I tore at his mouth with the curb, and hit him over the head with my fist. It seemed to astonish him, for he let go the other horse, and settled on his four feet again. It was all the other man wanted: he was out of sight round the corner before you could say “Parallelopipedon.”