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The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce — Volume 2: In the Midst of Life: Tales of Soldiers and Civilians by Ambrose Bierce
page 9 of 263 (03%)

An officer of the Federal force, who in a spirit of adventure or in
quest of knowledge had left the hidden _bivouac_ in the valley, and with
aimless feet had made his way to the lower edge of a small open space
near the foot of the cliff, was considering what he had to gain by
pushing his exploration further. At a distance of a quarter-mile before
him, but apparently at a stone's throw, rose from its fringe of pines
the gigantic face of rock, towering to so great a height above him that
it made him giddy to look up to where its edge cut a sharp, rugged line
against the sky. It presented a clean, vertical profile against a
background of blue sky to a point half the way down, and of distant
hills, hardly less blue, thence to the tops of the trees at its base.
Lifting his eyes to the dizzy altitude of its summit the officer saw an
astonishing sight--a man on horseback riding down into the valley
through the air!

Straight upright sat the rider, in military fashion, with a firm seat in
the saddle, a strong clutch upon the rein to hold his charger from too
impetuous a plunge. From his bare head his long hair streamed upward,
waving like a plume. His hands were concealed in the cloud of the
horse's lifted mane. The animal's body was as level as if every
hoof-stroke encountered the resistant earth. Its motions were those of a
wild gallop, but even as the officer looked they ceased, with all the
legs thrown sharply forward as in the act of alighting from a leap. But
this was a flight!

Filled with amazement and terror by this apparition of a horseman in the
sky--half believing himself the chosen scribe of some new Apocalypse,
the officer was overcome by the intensity of his emotions; his legs
failed him and he fell. Almost at the same instant he heard a crashing
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