vered with green baize, and with a number of books and blue
papers all neatly arranged upon it. Behind it sat an officer, dressed
in a dark-blue uniform, with braided front, and a peaked cap encircled
with a dark band and bearing a miniature grenade in front. It was the
adjutant, and he at once cross-questioned the new recruits.

"Both of you have been in a menagerie," he remarked with some
astonishment, "but surely you--and he pointed towards, Phil--have had
some education?"

"Yes, sir, I have been to a good school," Phil answered, "and before I
joined the menagerie I was a clerk in an office for a short time."

"Ah, just the kind of man we want!" exclaimed the officer. "And both of
you wish to enlist in the Grenadier Guards? Very well; send them across
to the doctor's."

"Right turn! Quick march!" The words almost made Tony jump out of his
skin, but he and Phil obeyed them promptly, and next moment were
breathing a trifle more freely in the open air. A corporal was now sent
for, and he conducted them across to another room. Here they were told
to strip, and a few minutes later were ushered into an inner room, in
which were the regimental doctor and a sergeant who sat with a book
before him. Phil and Tony were sounded and thumped all over, and then
told to hop up and down the floor. They swung their arms round their
heads till they were red in the face, and swung their legs to and fro to
show that they had free movement of their joints. Then their eyes were
tested, and these and their hearing having proved satisfactory, they
were declared fit for the army, and were told to dress themselves.

"What's coming next, Phil?" whispered Tony, with a chuckle. "We've been
interviewed--or whatever they calls it--by the officer, and now we've
been punched all over, like folks used to do with that prize mare the
boss in the old show was so fond of."

"Wait and see," Phil answered, for he too was wondering what their next
experience would be.

They had not long to wait. The same corporal who had conducted them
before took them round to the back of the building, up a steep flight of
stairs, and showed them into the quarter-master's stores. And here they
spent almost an hour, during which time a complete set of uniform, with
the exception of a bearskin, was served out to each of them. Their
civilian clothing was then taken from them and safely packed away, and
feeling remarkably queer, and uncertain how to carry