direction of Pine
Island. The other companies also broke up, and in a minute more the
cadets were really and truly on the march for the camp.

The drums and fifes sounded well on that bracing morning air, and quite
a crowd of boys and not a few girls followed the students over the
first of the hills back of Putnam Hall. But here the crowd dropped
gradually away, until the young soldiers had the country road
practically to themselves.

For a full mile the cadets were made to keep in step. Then came the
order, "Route step!" and they moved forward as pleased them, keeping
together, however, by companies. The route step is given that one may
take the step that is most natural to him, be it longer or shorter than
the regulation step.

Farms were rather scattered in that neighborhood, but occasionally
they passed country homes, when all the folks would rush forth to learn
what the drumming and fifing meant.

"They are the Putnam Hall cadets," said one farm woman. "How neat they
look and how nicely they march!"

"Puts me in mind o' war times, Mirandy," said her husband. "Don't you
remember how the boys marched away in them days"?

"Indeed I do, Ira," answered the woman. "But that was real, while this
is only for fun."

"Well, I reckon some o' those lads would make putty good soldiers, were
they put to it. They handle their guns like veterans."

The cadets marched until ten o'clock and then stopped for a brief rest
near a fine hillside spring, where all procured a drink. Then they
moved forward again until noon, when they reached a small village where
dinner already awaited them.

"We have covered twelve miles," said Captain Putnam. "Eight more, and
the day's march will be over."

The cadets were glad enough to eat their dinner and take it easy on the
porch of the old country hotel at which they had stopped.

"Imagine us marching off to war," observed Sam. "How would you like it,
Tom"?

"Oh, I don't think I would complain," was the answer. "Anything for a
bit of excitement."

The day's march was completed long before sundown, and the battalion
came to a halt in an open field through which flowed a shaded brook.

The tents were at hand and the students lost no time in putting up the
shelters.

Food was supplied for the occasion by a farmer living near, for it was
not deemed advisable to unload the cook stoves and build the necessary
fires.

The farmer gave the students permission to visit his apple orchard,