wonderingly about their new quarters.

Luxury? Not a bit of it. The room was severely plain. At one end
was a double alcove, separated by a wall. In each alcove stood a
bare-looking iron bedstead. There were two washbowls, two
chairs and two desks that looked as though they had served the
needs of generations of cadets. There was a window that looked
out on the quadrangular area of barracks.

"Well, we're actually here, anyway," breathed Dick, his eyes
sparkling. "We're living in cadet barracks, and we're halfway
through the ordeal of becoming new cadets at the wonderful old
United States Military Academy!"

CHAPTER II

THE TYRANNY OF THE CADET CORPORAL

Dick hung up his coat and hat, and Greg did the same, for the
heat was turned on and the room wholly comfortable as to
temperature.

"I've heard," murmured Greg, "that fellows usually get most
woefully homesick at West Point."

"Then they've no business to come here," retorted Prescott, with
spirit. "Such tender ones won't make soldiers anyway."

"I suppose we shall be awfully looked down on at first," mused
Greg aloud.

"Well, we can stand it," laughed Dick. "If we can't, we can't endure
lots more of things that are ahead of us."

"Just now I could endure a good, filling meal," sighed Holmes
comically.

"Yes?" laughed Prescott. "Then just press the button and the waiter
will bring us the bill of fare. I understand that candidates are
allowed to have their meals served in rooms. Although I believe
it's forbidden for any candidate, or cadet, either, to eat his
breakfast in bed."

"Quit your 'kidding,'" begged Greg.

"I don't know that the authorities will bother to feed us, anyway,
until we've passed and it's known that we are going to stay and be
cadets," laughed young Prescott, feeling around his belt-line, for
he, too, was hungry.

"Candidates turn out promptly!" rang, from below, a voice full of
military command.

Greg was in the middle of a comforting yawn and stretch. He
dallied to finish it, but Dick, snatching down his overcoat and hat,
was already out on the landing and racing below, while behind him
floated the advice:

"Come on, Greg! Get a boost on!"

"Get along there, beasts," commanded a cadet corporal in the
lower hallway sternly. "This is no sleeping match!"

Out in the yard several candidates had already run. Some of these
young men at home, had been accustomed to being waited on by
mothers and sisters. Yet here, in