a step
behind--just the dearest cart! Rose Bunker said.

"Oh, I know I can learn to drive that dear, dear pony!" Rose added. "And
there is room for every one of you children with me in the cart."

"Huh!" exclaimed Laddie. "I am going to ride pony-back like Russ does.
Which is my pony, Mr. Cowboy Jack?" he asked of the ranchman who had
followed them out of the house to enjoy their amazement and delight.

"The one with the shortest stirrups, I guess," Russ said. "This one
looks as if I could ride him," and he took the bridle handed him by the
Mexican.

"Oh, lift me up! Lift me up!" cried Laddie, running to the other saddle
pony.

Cowboy Jack strode down and did so. Meanwhile Rose and the other
children were scrambling into the pony-cart, while the pony which drew
it tossed its head and looked around as though counting the number of
passengers that were getting aboard.

"Isn't he just cute?" cried Rose again. "Oh, Mr. Cowboy Jack! you are so
good to us."

"Got to be," said the ranchman, laughing. "I haven't any little folks of
my own, so I have to treat those I find around here pretty well, I do
say."

Laddie clung to both the pommel and the bridle-reins at first, for he
did seem so high from the ground at first. But Russ trotted away on his
pony very securely. Russ had ridden quite a little at Uncle Fred's ranch
and had not forgotten how.

Rose decided that she liked better to drive. But Vi must learn to drive,
too, she said. And even Margy and Mun Bun clamored to hold the reins
over the back of the sleepy brown pony. Russ's mount was what Cowboy
Jack called a pinto, but Russ said it was a calico pony. He had seen
them marked that way before--in the circus. Laddie's pony was all white,
with pinkish nose and ears. Right at the start Laddie called him
"Pinky." But the little girls could not agree on a name for the pony
that drew their cart.

There seemed to be so many nice names that just fitted him! Margy wanted
to call him Dinah after her lost doll.

"But that Dinah-doll was black," said Rose, in objection. "And this pony
is brown. Maybe we ought to call him Brownie."

"Oh! I know!" cried Vi. "Let's call him Cute. He's just as cunning as he
can be."

But this name did not appeal to the others, and they were no nearer
finding a name for the brown pony when the ride was over and they all
came back to the ranch house than at first. They had had so much fun,
however, that they had forgotten for the time bein