, but he was still trotting manfully.

"Stop a minute!" said his grandfather. "Where's your hat?"

Wilkins touched his. "It fell off, your lordship," he said, with evident
enjoyment. "Wouldn't let me stop to pick it up, my lord."

"Not much afraid, is he?" asked the Earl dryly.

"Him, your lordship!" exclaimed Wilkins. "I shouldn't say as he knowed
what it meant. I've taught young gen'lemen to ride afore, an' I never
see one stick on more determinder."

"Tired?" said the Earl to Fauntleroy. "Want to get off?"

"It jolts you more than you think it will," admitted his young lordship
frankly. "And it tires you a little, too; but I don't want to get off.
I want to learn how. As soon as I've got my breath I want to go back for
the hat."

The cleverest person in the world, if he had undertaken to teach
Fauntleroy how to please the old man who watched him, could not have
taught him anything which would have succeeded better. As the pony
trotted off again toward the avenue, a faint color crept up in the
fierce old face, and the eyes, under the shaggy brows, gleamed with a
pleasure such as his lordship had scarcely expected to know again. And
he sat and watched quite eagerly until the sound of the horses' hoofs
returned. When they did come, which was after some time, they came at a
faster pace. Fauntleroy's hat was still off; Wilkins was carrying it for
him; his cheeks were redder than before, and his hair was flying about
his ears, but he came at quite a brisk canter.

"There!" he panted, as they drew up, "I c-cantered. I didn't do it as
well as the boy on Fifth Avenue, but I did it, and I staid on!"

He and Wilkins and the pony were close friends after that. Scarcely a
day passed in which the country people did not see them out together,
cantering gayly on the highroad or through the green lanes. The children
in the cottages would run to the door to look at the proud little brown
pony with the gallant little figure sitting so straight in the saddle,
and the young lord would snatch off his cap and swing it at them, and
shout, "Hullo! Good-morning!" in a very unlordly manner, though with
great heartiness. Sometimes he would stop and talk with the children,
and once Wilkins came back to the castle with a story of how Fauntleroy
had insisted on dismounting near the village school, so that a boy who
was lame and tired might ride home on his pony.

"An' I'm blessed," said Wilkins, in telling the story at the
stables,--"I'