eyes over his uniform, making the boy colour like a
girl.

"Well, you do look nice," she said; "only don't knock me down again.
There, I'm not hurt. They're quite new, ain't they?"

Sydney nodded.

"I thought so, because you haven't got them on quite right."

Sydney stopped to hear no more, but ran on, checked himself, and tried
to walk past three waiters in the entry with dignity.

He did not achieve this, because if he had the waiters would not have
laughed and put their napkins to their mouths, on drawing back to let
him pass.

"Oh, shouldn't I like to!" he thought, as he set his teeth and clenched
his fists.

He felt very miserable and as if he was being made a laughing-stock; in
fact his sensations were exactly those of a sensitive lad who appears in
uniform for the first time; and hence he was in anything but a peaceful
state of mind as he dashed into the room where his uncle was waiting, to
be greeted with a roar of laughter.

"What a time you have been, sir! Why, Syd, I don't think much of your
legs, and, hang it all, your belt's too loose, and they don't fit you.
Bah! you haven't half dressed yourself. Come here. Takes me back fifty
years, boy, to see you like that."

"Why did you tell me to go and put them on?" cried the boy, angrily, "if
you only meant to laugh at me?"

"Bah! nonsense! What do you mean, sir? Are you going to be so
thin-skinned that you can't bear to be joked? Come here."

The boy stood by his side.

"I was going to show you how to take up your belt and to button your
waistcoat. There! that's better. Flying out like that at me because I
laughed! How will you get along among your messmates, who are sure to
begin roasting you as soon as you go aboard?"

"I beg your pardon, uncle. I seemed to feel so ridiculous, and
everybody laughed."

"Let them. There! that's better. See how a touch or two from one who
knows turns a slovenly look into one that's smart. Hallo! some one at
the door, my lad; go and see. No; stop. Come in."

The door was opened, and Barney in his uniform of petty officer entered,
looking smartened up into a man ten years younger than when he worked in
the garden at the Heronry.

As Barney took off his hat and entered, closing the door behind him, his
eyes lit first upon Syd, and his face puckered up into a broad grin.

"And now you!" cried Sydney, angrily. "Uncle, I'm not fit to wear a
uniform; I look ridiculous."

"Who says so?" cried the