horse. That mare, which had been a mirror of all the virtues all the
afternoon, was off like a rocket. She overtook an electric car as if it
had been standing still. Ellis sawed her mouth; he might as well have
sawed the funnel of a locomotive. He had meant to turn off and traverse
Bursley by secluded streets, but he perceived that safety lay solely in
letting her go straight ahead up the very steep slope of Oldcastle
Street into the middle of the town. It would be an amazing mare that
galloped to the top of Oldcastle Street! She galloped nearly to the top,
and then Ellis began to get hold of her a bit.

'Don't be afraid,' he said masculinely to Ada.

And, conscious of victory, he jerked the mare to the left to avoid an
approaching car....

The next instant they were anchored against the roots of a lamp-post.
When Ellis saw the upper half of the lamp-post bent down at right
angles, and pieces of glass covering the pavement, he could not believe
that he and his dogcart had done that, especially as neither the mare,
nor the dogcart, nor its freight, was damaged. The machine was merely
jammed, and the mare, satisfied, stood quiet, breathing rapidly.

But Ada Jenkins was crying.

And the car stopped a moment to observe. And then a number of
chapel-goers on their way to the Sytch Chapel, which the Carter family
still faithfully attended, joined the scene; and then a policeman.

Ellis sat like a stuck pig in the dogcart. He knew that speech was
demanded of him, but he did not know where to begin.