the auctioneer, bending forward with
great respect and dignity toward the diminutive purchaser.

"Chad."

The auctioneer put his hand to one ear.

"I beg your pardon--Dan'l Boone did you say?"

"No!" shouted Chad indignantly--he began to feel that fun was going on
at his expense. "You heerd me--CHAD."

"Ah, Mr. Chad."

Not a soul knew the boy, but they liked his spirit, and several
followed him when he went up and handed his five dollars and took the
halter of his new treasure trembling so that he could scarcely stand.
The owner of the horse placed his hand on the little fellow's head.

"Wait a minute," he said, and, turning to a negro boy: "Jim, go bring a
bridle." The boy brought out a bridle, and the tall man slipped it on
the old mare's head, and Chad led her away--the crowd watching him.
Just outside he saw the Major, whose eyes opened wide:

"Where'd you get that old horse, Chad?"

"Bought her," said Chad.

"What? What'd you give for her?"

"Five dollars."

The Major looked pained, for he thought the boy was lying, but Richard
Hunt called him aside and told the story of the purchase; and then how
the Major did laugh--laughed until the tears rolled down his face.

And then and there he got out of his carriage and went into a saddler's
shop and bought a brand new saddle with a red blanket, and put it on
the old mare and hoisted the boy to his seat. Chad was to have no
little honor in his day, but he never knew a prouder moment than when
he clutched the reins in his left hand and squeezed his short legs
against the fat sides of that old brown mare.

He rode down the street and back again, and then the Major told him he
had better put the black boy on the mare, to ride her home ahead of
him, and Chad reluctantly got off and saw the little darky on his new
saddle and his new horse.

"Take good keer o' that hoss, boy," he said, with a warning shake of
his head, and again the Major roared.

First, the Major said, he would go by the old University and leave word
with the faculty for the school-master when he should come there to
matriculate; and so, at a turnstile that led into a mighty green yard
in the middle of which stood a huge gray mass of stone, the carriage
stopped, and the Major got out and walked through the campus and up the
great flight of stone steps and disappeared. The mighty columns, the
stone steps--where had Chad heard of them? And then the truth flashed.
This was the college of whi