But it is
meet I should, in the true spirit of romantic story, give some account
of the looks and equipments of my hero and his steed. The animal he
bestrode was a broken-down plow-horse that had outlived almost
everything but his viciousness. He was gaunt and shagged, with a ewe
neck and a head like a hammer; his rusty mane and tail were tangled and
knotted with burrs; one eye had lost its pupil, and was glaring and
spectral, but the other had the gleam of a genuine devil in it. Still
he must have had fire and mettle in his day, if we may judge from his
name, which was Gunpowder. He had, in fact, been a favorite steed of
his master's, the choleric Van Ripper, who was a furious rider, and had
infused, very probably, some of his own spirit into the animal; for,
old and broken-down as he looked, there was more of the lurking devil
in him than in any young filly in the country.

Ichabod was a suitable figure for such a steed. He rode with short
stirrups, which brought his knees nearly up to the pommel of the
saddle; his sharp elbows stuck out like grasshoppers'; he carried his
whip perpendicularly in his hand, like a scepter, and as the horse
jogged on, the motion of his arms was not unlike the flapping of a pair
of wings. A small wool hat rested on the top of his nose, for so his
scanty strip of forehead might be called, and the skirts of his black
coat fluttered out almost to the horse's tail. Such was the appearance
of Ichabod and his steed as they shambled out of the gate of Hans Van
Ripper, and it was altogether such an apparition as is seldom to be met
with in broad daylight.

It was, as I have said, a fine autumnal day; the sky was clear and
serene, and nature wore that rich and golden livery which we always
associate with the idea of abundance. The forests had put on their
sober brown and yellow, while some trees of the tenderer kind had been
nipped by the frosts into brilliant dyes of orange, purple, and
scarlet. Streaming files of wild ducks began to make their appearance
high in the air; the bark of the squirrel might be heard from the
groves of beech and hickory-nuts, and the pensive whistle of the quail
at intervals from the neighboring stubble-field.

The small birds were taking their farewell banquets. In the fullness
of their revelry, they fluttered, chirping and frolicking, from bush to
bush and tree to tree, capricious from the very profusion and variety
around them. There was the honest co