“I will, my lad. To-morrow morning same time; and I’ll get some of that stiffness out of you.”
“Thank you,” I said rather dolefully; and then I could not help watching the old dragoon with a feeling of envy as he placed one foot in the stirrup, drew himself up till he stood upright, then deliberately threw the right leg over the horse’s back, slowly dropped into his place as upright as a dart, and trotted steadily out into the road and away out of sight, while, after closing the gate, I began to retrace my steps in the direction of the school, just as the boys came trooping out for their regular run till the room was ventilated, and the cloth laid for dinner.
“Oh, I say, it’s rank favouritism!” came from the middle of a group. “I shall speak to the Doctor about it.”
Some one answered this, but I did not hear the words, and I hobbled to the door, and went up to my room, wondering how any one could be envious of the sensations I was experiencing then.
Chapter Seventeen.
“How are your sore knees?” said Mercer one morning soon after my long first lesson in riding.
“Oh, dreadful!” I cried. “They get a little better, and then the riding makes them bad again.”
“But why don’t he let you have a saddle?”