It may well be imagined that the animals were less convinced of the
necessity of this performance than their masters. Wonderful was the
clatter and confusion, horrible the uproar raised behind to make the
poor things proceed at all, desperate the shout when some half-
frantic creature kicked or attempted a charge wild the glee when a
persecuted goat or sheep took heart of grace, and flashed for one
moment between the crackling, flaring, smoking walls. When one cow
or sheep off a farm went, all the others were pretty sure to follow
it, and the owner had then only to be on the watch at the other end
to turn them back, with their flame-dazzled eyes, from going unawares
down the precipice, a fate from which the passing through the fire
was evidently not supposed to ensure them. The swine, those special
German delights, were of course the most refractory of all. Some, by
dint of being pulled away from the lane of fire, were induced to rush
through it; but about half-way they generally made a bolt, either
sidelong through the flaming fence or backwards among the legs of
their persecutors, who were upset amid loud imprecations.
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