Horses reared and plunged and wheeled.

All was at once in confusion.

The men made frantic efforts to seize their tormentors, but not one could they touch; and they outdoubled them in numbers.

Between every wild clutch came a peck of beak and a buffet of pinion in the face.

Generally the bird would, with sharp-clapping wings, dart its whole body, with the swiftness of an arrow, against its singled mark, yet so as to glance aloft the same instant, and descend skimming; much as the thin stone, shot with horizontal cast of arm, having touched and torn the surface of the lake, ascends to skim, touch, and tear again.