'There, Ben'
he'd say to me, chucking me the rein, and jumpin' off as light as a
feather, 'we've worked our spirits h'off--Ruby and me!' When the old
squire were alive, he'd have all three young gentlemen up, and then he'd
mount them and bring them down to Ruddocks stream, and see them jump it.
He used to say, 'No grandson of mine is worth calling a Bertram if he
can't take that leap before he is twelve year old!' They all did it
before they was ten, and he used to stand chuckling and rubbing his
hands as he saw them do it."
"Is that the stream at the bottom of the back meadow?" asked Dudley,
eagerly; "the one with the hedge in front?"
"Ay, to be sure!"
"But we have never jumped it," exclaimed Roy. "And I think we ought to
for we're his great-grandsons."
"We shan't be twelve for a long time yet," said Dudley, "but we really
ought to try."
"Well, we'll do it this evening after tea; and you shall come and see us
do it, Ben."
Ben grinned from ear to ear.
"You'll go over it like a bird, if so be as your pony is accustomed to
sich things!"
"We haven't taken very high jumps," admitted Dudley, candidly.
"Oh, we shall do it," said Roy, with a little toss of his head; "we'll
_make_ them go over!"
And then they turned to other subjects.
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