West Point Colors

by Anna Bartlett Warner

"Suppose we cannot?"

"Front door's open," said Magnus, falling to work with his hammer, and once more lapsing into the sweets of "Yankee Doodle."

"Mother, may we tell him?" said Rose. "May we ask him how he'd like it?"

"Why, yes, dear; that can do no harm," said Mrs. Kindred.

So the girls went down to the woodshed, perching themselves on some hard places each side of their big brother.

"Magnus, how would you like to be a soldier?"

"When there's a war, you'll see."

That was beginning at the wrong end; the two young faces grew suddenly grave. But, after all, there was no war then, and probably never would be, as their mother had said.

"But we mean now," Rose went on. "How would you like to go to West Point?"

"What for?"