Frightened as I was, perhaps good indignation helped me to flutter no more, and not faint away, but watch those miscreants steadily.
The horses put down their sandy lips over and over again to drink, scarcely knowing when they ought to stop, and seemed to get thicker before my eyes.

The dribbling of the water from their mouths prepared them to begin again, till the riders struck the savage unroweled spur into their refreshment.

At this they jerked their noses up, and looked at one another to say that they expected it, and then they lifted their weary legs and began to plash through the river.
It is a pretty thing to see a skillful horse plod through a stream, probing with his eyes the depth, and stretching his head before his feet, and at every step he whisks his tail to tell himself that he is right.

In my agony of observation all these things I heeded, but only knew that I had done so when I thought long afterward.

At the moment I was in such a fright that my eyes worked better than my mind.