reply of his sister's set Bert's little brain at work. Mr.
Hamilton, the superintendent of the Sunday school, was a tall, erect
handsome man, with fine grey hair and whiskers, altogether an impressive
gentleman; yet he had a most winning manner, and Bert was won to him at
once when he was welcomed by him warmly to the school. Bert could not
imagine anything grander than to be a Christian soldier, if it meant
being like Mr. Hamilton. Still the fireman notion had too many
attractions to be lightly thrown aside, and consequently for some time
to come he could hardly be said to know his own mind as to his future.

The presence of the military in Halifax was far from being an unmixed
good. Of course, it helped business, gave employment to many hands,
imparted peculiar life and colour to society, and added many excellent
citizens to the population. At the same time it had very marked
drawbacks. There was always a great deal of drunkenness and other
dissipation among the soldiers and sailors. The officers were not the
most improving of companions and models for the young men of the place,
and in other ways the city was the worse for their presence.

Mrs. Lloyd presently found the soldiers a source of danger to her boy.
Just around the corner at the entrance to the old fort, already
mentioned, was a guardhouse, and here some half-dozen soldiers were
stationed day and night. They were usually jolly fellows, who were glad
to get hold of little boys to play with, and thereby help to while away
the time in their monotonous life. Cuthbert soon discovered the
attractions of this guardhouse, and, in spite of commands to the
contrary, which he seemed unable to remember, wandered off thither very
often. All the other little boys in the neighbourhood went there
whenever they liked, and he could not understand why he should not do so
too. He did not really mean to defy his parents. He was too young for
that, being only six years old. But the force of the example of his
playmates seemed stronger than the known wishes of his parents, and so
he disobeyed them again and again.

Mrs. Lloyd might, of course, have carried her point by shutting Bert up
in the yard, and not allowing him out at all except in charge of
somebody. But that was precisely what she did not wish to do. She knew
well enough that her son could not have a locked-up world to live in. He
must learn to live in this world, full of temptations as it is, and so
her idea was not