r did the applicant
move forward to sign.

"After you have signed this," said the young officer, keeping his eyes
down on the paper before him, "you will have become a servant of the
United States; you will sit in that other room until the office is
closed for to-day, and then you will be led over to the Navy-yard and
put into a uniform, and from that time on for three years you will
have a number, the same number as the one on your musket. You and the
musket will both belong to the government. You will clean and load
the musket, and fight with it if God ever gives us the chance; and the
government will feed you and keep you clean, and fight with you if
needful."

The lieutenant looked up at the corporal and said, "You can go,
Goddard," and the corporal turned on his heel and walked downstairs,
wondering.

"You may spend the three years," continued the officer, still without
looking at the applicant, "which are the best years of a young man's
life, on the sea, visiting foreign ports, or you may spend it marching
up and down the Brooklyn Navy-yard and cleaning brass-work. There are
some men who are meant to clean brass-work and to march up and down in
front of a stone arsenal, and who are fitted for nothing else. But to
every man is given something which should tell him that he is put here
to make the best of himself. Every man has that, even the men who are
only fit to clean brass rods; but some men kill it, or try to kill it,
in different ways, generally by rum. And they are as generally
successful, if they keep the process up long enough. The government,
of which I am a very humble representative, is always glad to get good
men to serve her, but it seems to me (and I may be wrong, and I'm
quite sure that I am speaking contrary to Regulations) that some of
her men can serve her better in other ways than swabbing down decks.
Now, you know yourself best. It may be that you are just the sort of
man to stand up and salute the ladies when they come on board to see
the ship, and to watch them from for'ard as they walk about with the
officers. You won't be allowed to speak to them; you will be number
329 or 328, and whatever benefits a good woman can give a man will be
shut off from you, more or less, for three years.

"And, on the other hand, it may be that there are some good women who
could keep you on shore, and help you to do something more with
yourself than to carry a musket. And, again, it may be that if you
sta