gies in that
direction. I declare, Glen, I hardly know how to advise you in this
matter. Do you think of any particular thing you would rather do, or try
to be? If so, and I can help you to it, you know how gladly I will, in
every way that lies in my power."

"It seems to me I would rather be a civil-engineer than anything else,"
answered the boy, a little hesitatingly.

"A civil-engineer!" exclaimed the other, in surprise; "why, Glen, lad,
don't you know that it takes the hardest kind of study to be that?"

Just then their conversation was interrupted by the arrival of a
visitor, who, to Glen's surprise, was none other than Mr. Hobart, the
engineer whose position he had been thinking of as one of the most
desirable in the world.

After a few moments' pleasant chat the visitor asked Mr. Matherson if he
could have a private business talk with him. So Glen left the room, and
wandered restlessly about the house, filled with a lively curiosity as
to what business the engineer could have with his adopted father.

In the meantime Mr. Hobart was saying, "I have known your son for some
time by sight, Mr. Matherson, and took a fancy to him from the first. We
only got acquainted to-day, when he performed an act of daring in my
presence, and at the same time rendered me an important service. I find
him to be exactly such a boy as I supposed he was; a generous-hearted,
manly fellow, who is just now unhappy and discontented because he has no
particular aim in life, and does not know what he wants to do."

"Yes," said Mr. Matherson, "that is just the trouble; and the worst of
it is that I don't know what to advise him."

"Then, perhaps, I am just in time to help you. My work here is about
finished, and in a few days I am to leave for Kansas, where I am to take
charge of a locating-party on one of the Pacific railroads. If you are
willing to let Glen go with me, I can make a place for him in this
party. The pay will only be thirty dollars per month, besides his
expenses; but, by the end of the summer, I believe he will have gained
more valuable knowledge and experience than he could in a year of home
and school life. I believe, too, in that time I can show him the value
of an education and the necessity of studying for it. Now, without
really knowing anything about it, he thinks he would like to become a
civil-engineer. After a few months' experience in the unsettled country
to which I am going he will have seen the rough side