Sentence:  Why, swimming “dog fashion” can bear no comparison with it, while the almost frantic efforts of the young man to keep his toes on term firma, seemed to us a most vivid illustration of the days when the “big boys” used to make us “<WSD>walk turkey</WSD>". 
Meaning of the word marked with <WSD> tags:  To walk with the chest pushed out in front (often due to being pushed or forced)