Spanish. I have mentioned your names to him. It is not often that I confidently recommend young officers, but from what I know of you I have felt able to do so in the present You will, with him, have opportunities of distinguishing yourselves such as you could not have with your regiment. You accept the appointments ?"

case.

Tom and Peter would far rather have remained with their regiment, but they felt that, after what Lord Wellington had said, they could not refuse; they consequently expressed at once their willingness to serve, and their thanks to the general for his kindness in recommending them.

"You can ride, I hope?" Lord Beresford, a powerfullybuilt, pleasant-looking man, said.

"Yes, sir, we can both ride, but at present—”

"You have no horses, of course?" Lord Beresford put in. "I will provide you with horses, and will assign servants to you from one of the cavalry regiments with me. Will you join me at daybreak to-morrow? we shall march at once."

There was a general expression of regret when the Scudamores informed their comrades that they were again ordered on detached duty. As to Sam, when Tom told him that he could not accompany them, he was uproarious in his lamentations, and threatened to desert from his regiment in order to follow them. At this the boys laughed, and told Sam that he would be arrested and sent back before he had gone six hours.

"I tink, Massa Tom, dat you might hab told de general dat you hab got an fust-class serbent, and dat you bring him wid you."

"But we shall be mounted now, Sam, and must have mounted men with us. You can't ride, you know."

"Yes, massa, dis child ride first-rate, he can."

'Why, Sam, I heard you say not long ago you had never ridden on a horse all your life."

"Never hab, massa, dat's true 'nuff; but Sam sure he can ride. Berry easy ting dat. Sit on saddle, one leg each sidenot berry difficult dat. Sam see tousand soldiers do dat ebery day; dey sit quite easy on saddle; much more easy dat dan beat big drum."

The boys laughed heartily at Sam's notion of riding without practice, and assured him that it was not so easy as he imagined.

"Look here, Sam," Peter said at last, "you practice riding a little, and then next time we get away we will ask for you to go with us.” And with this Sam was obliged to be

content.

Half an hour later, when the boys were chatting with Captain Manley, Carruthers, and two or three other officers, in the tent of the first-named officer, they heard a commotion outside, with shouts of laughter, in which they joined as soon as they went out and saw what was going on.

Sam, upon leaving the Scudamores, determined at once upon trying the experiment of riding, in order that he might-for he had no doubt all would be easy enough-ride triumphantly up to his masters' tent and prove his ability to accompany them at once. He was not long before he saw a muleteer coming along sitting carelessly on his mule, with both legs on one side of the animal, side-saddle fashion, as is the frequent custom of muleteers. It was evident, by the slowness of his pace, that he was not pressed for time.

Sam thought that this was a fine opportunity.

"Let me have a ride?" he said to the muleteer in broken Portuguese.

The man shook his head. Sam held out a quarter of a

dollar. "There," he said, "I'll give you that for an hour's ride."

The muleteer hesitated, and then said, "The mule is very bad tempered with strangers."

"Oh, dat all nonsense," Sam thought, "he only pretend dat as excuse; anyone can see de creature as quiet as lamb; don't he let his master sit on him sideways?"

"All right," he said aloud, "I try him."

The muleteer dismounted, and Sam prepared to take his place on the saddle. By this time several of the Rangers had gathered round, and these foreseeing, from the appearance of the mule and the look of sly amusement in the face of the muleteer, that there was likely to be some fun, at once proposed to assist, which they did by giving advice to Sam of the most opposite nature. Sam was first going to mount on the off side, but this irregularity was repressed, and one wag, taking the stirrup of the near side in his hand, said, 'Now, Sam, up you go, never mind what these fellows say, you put your right foot in the stirrup, and lift your left over the saddle."

66

Sam acted according to these instructions, and found himself, to his intense amazement and the delight of the bystanders, sitting with his face to the mule's tail.

"Hullo," he exclaimed in astonishment, "dis all wrong; you know noting about de business, you Bill Atkins."

And Sam prepared to descend, when, at his first movement, the mule put down his head and flung his heels high in the air. Sam instinctively threw himself forward, but not recovering his upright position before the mule again flung up her hind quarters, he received a violent blow on the nose. "Golly!" exclaimed the black in a tone of extreme anguish, as, with water streaming from his eyes, he instinctively clutched the first thing

which came to hand, the root of the mule's tail, and held on like grim death. The astonished mule lashed out wildly and furiously, but Sam, with his body laid close on her back, his hands grasping her tail, and his legs and feet pressing tight to her flanks, held on with the clutch of despair.

"Seize de debil !-seize him !—he gone mad!"--he shouted frantically, but the soldiers were in such fits of laughter that they could do nothing.

Then the mule, finding that he could not get rid of this singular burden by kicking, started suddenly off at full gallop.

Stop him-stop him!" yelled Sam. "Gracious me! dis am drefful."

This was the sight which met the eyes of the Scudamores and their brother officers as they issued from their tents. The soldiers were all out of their tents now, and the air rang with laughter mingled with shouts of "Go it, moke!" "Hold on,

Sam!"

"Stop that mule," Captain Manley shouted, "or the man will be killed."

Several soldiers ran to catch at the bridle, but the mule swerved and dashed away out of camp along the road.

"Look, look," Tom said, "there are the staff, and Lord Wellington among them. The mule's going to charge

them."

The road was somewhat narrow, with a wall of four feet high on either side, and the general, who was riding at the head of the party, drew his rein when he saw the mule coming along at a furious gallop. The staff did the same, and a general shout was raised to check or divert her wild career. The obstinate brute, however, maddened by the shouts which had greeted her from all sides, and the strange manner in which