ent one was of a more alarming
nature than anything that had gone before. One of her tricks, bolting,
was not so very serious, but now she proved herself a "blind bolter."
And among horsemen there is only one thing to do with a blind
bolter--shoot it. A horse of this description seems to be imbued with
but one idea--a furious desire to go, to run anywhere, to run into
anything lying in its course, to run on until its strength is spent,
or its career is suddenly terminated by a forcible full stop.

At the bend of the trail the mare took blindly to the bush. Chance
guided her on to a cattle-path which cut through to the pinewoods
beyond. It was but a matter of moments before her rider saw the dark
shadow of the woodlands come at him with a rush, and he plunged
headlong into the gray twilight of their virgin depths. He had just
time to crouch down in the saddle, with his face buried in the tangle
of the creature's flying mane, when the drooping boughs, laden with
their sad foliage, swept his back. He knew there were only two
courses open to him. Either he must sit tight and chance his luck till
the mad frolic was spent, or throw himself headlong from the saddle at
the first likely spot. A more experienced horseman would, no doubt,
have chosen the latter course without a second thought. But he
preferred to stay with the mare. He was loth to admit defeat. She had
never bested him yet, and a sort of petty vanity refused to allow him
to acknowledge her triumph now. They might come to an opening, he told
himself, a stretch of open country. The mare might tire of the forest
gloom and turn prairieward. These things suggested themselves merely
as an excuse for his foolhardiness in remaining in the saddle, not
that he had any hope of their fulfilment.

And so it was. Nothing moved the animal out of her course, and it
seemed almost as though a miracle were in operation. For, in all that
labyrinth of tree-trunks, a sheer road constantly opened out before
them. Once, and once only, disaster was within an ace of him. She
brushed a mighty black-barked giant with her shoulders. Tresler's knee
struck it with such painful force that his foot was wrenched from the
stirrup and dragged back so that the rowel of his spur was plunged,
with terrific force, into the creature's flank. She responded to the
blow with a sideways leap, and it was only by sheer physical strength
her rider retained his seat. Time and again the reaching boughs swept
hi