But he was too heavily handicapped.

He slipped as he rose to the leap.

He blundered badly against the top bar of the gate, finally stumbled over and fell on the other side, pitching his rider headlong into a slough of trampled mud.
He was up in a moment and careering across the field, but Doris was not so nimble.

It was by no means her first tumble, nor had it been wholly unexpected; but she had fallen with considerable violence, and it took her a second or two to collect her wits.

Then, like Hector, she sprang up--only to reel back through the slippery mud and catch at the splintered gate for support, there to cling sick and dizzy, with eyes fast shut, while the whole world rocked around her in chaos indescribable.
A full minute must have passed thus, then very suddenly out of the confusion came a voice.