wall. Opposite the entrance was the Commanding Officer's box,
beautifully draped with flags and wreaths of holly. In the box sat the
Colonel and Mrs. Fortescue, both looking wonderfully young and
handsome. The Colonel caught sight of the chaplain peering in at a
window below; the chaplain knew a horse from an automobile, and loved
horses too much for the good of his soul, so he thought. In a moment a
messenger came with the Colonel's compliments and the request for the
chaplain's company, and the chaplain obeyed with alacrity and a joy
almost unholy.

Above the murmur of conversation and laughter the band dominated,
playing soft Italian music. Suddenly and silently, as if in a dream,
the great entrance doors drew apart, the band changed into a great
military fanfare, and a splendid troop of cavalry charged in, the lithe
young troopers and the sleek horses with muscles of steel under their
satin skins, horse and man moving as one. After a dash around the
hall, they proceeded to show what troopers and horses could do. The
soldiers rode bareback and upside down, got on and off the horses in
ways incredible, made pyramids of troopers, the horses galloping at
full speed, stopped like machines, dismounted, the horses lay down and
the troopers, at full length, pounded out deadly imaginary volleys into
unseen enemies.

When this was over and the troopers had trotted out amid thunders of
applause, the great doors again slid open as if by magic and a battery
of light artillery rushed in, the band thundering out "For He Is a Son
of a Gun." The drivers, with four horses to each gun, sat like
statues, as did the three artillerymen, erect, with folded arms, as
straight and still as men of steel, and their backs to the horses, as
the guns sped around the hall and turned and twisted marvellously,