Page:Dapples of the Circus (1943).pdf/27

 "Oh, isn't he a beauty!" cried Olga excitedly. "What shall we call him?"

"His registered name," said Mr. Pederson, "is Sir Wilton Second, but I think we had better call him Dapple Dandy." This name fitted him so well that it stuck. So to the children and the neighbors he was always Dapple Dandy, but to men who came to the farm to buy horses, he was Sir Wilton Second.

The Pedersons at once took the newcomer into the family. He was given a stall in an open shed, which was really palatial for a Shetland pony. But it did not seem to impress him very much. If they could have seen the box stall from which he had been taken when he was crated and sent to the island, they would not have wondered at his indifference.

The children spent all their playtime with him. They rode him horseback, and they fed and watered him, in fact, took the entire care of him, after getting their instructions from their father.