CHAPTER XIX.
JIMMIE HIGGINS PUTS ON KHAKI. I.
There were seven fellows who boarded the train that evening, under the temporary charge of a blacksmith from the near by country. At seven o’clock next morning they presented their papers at the entrance-gate of the training-camp, and under the escort of a soldier were marched down the main street, hanging on to their bundles and suit-cases, and staring about them at the sights.
It was a city inhabited by some forty thousand men, on a site which a year ago had been waste scrub-land. Long rows of wooden buildings stretched in every direction—barracks, dining-rooms, study-rooms, offices, store-houses—with great stretches of exercise and training-grounds between. Just to see this city, with its swarming population of young men, all in uniform,
