You are just sixteen now, and although that is rather young I believe that a good many lads do get their commissions somewhere about that age.

In one of his letters Mr.
Penfold said that as soon as you came back he would take the matter in hand, and though I have good interest in other quarters and could probably manage it, Mr.Penfold has a great deal more than I have, and as he has expressed his willingness to arrange it I shall be grateful to him for doing so." "That will be first rate, mother," Ralph said in delight.

"I thought in another year I might get my commission; but of course it would be ever so much better to get it a year earlier." For the next few days Ralph was a hero among his boy friends, and had to tell his story so often that at last he told his mother that if it wasn't for leaving her so soon he should be quite ready to go off again for another visit to Mr.Penfold.
"You won't be called upon to do that," she said smiling; "for this letter that I have just opened is from him, and he tells me he is coming here at once to see you, for he thinks it would be too hard to ask me to spare you again so soon." "You don't mean to say that he is coming all that way ?" Ralph said in surprise.

"Well, I am very glad." "He asks me in his letter," Mrs.Conway said with a passing smile of amusement, "if I can take in a young friend of his, Miss Mabel Withers.

He says she has never been from home before, and that it would be a treat for her to get away and see a little of the world.