The captain had just received and read the report of his boy's conduct and academic standing for his first month and was much pleased with it. He made that very clear to the lad, calling him his dear son, his joy and pride, and telling him that until he was a father himself he could never know the joy and happiness such a report of a son's behavior and improvement of his opportunities could give.
"Ah," thought the boy, "I'll try harder than ever since it gives such pleasure to my kindest and best of fathers. How glad I am to have the chance! How thankful I ought to be! I doubt if there was ever a more fortunate boy than myself."
Max and his room-mate, Hunt, liked each other from the first, and seldom had the slightest disagreement.
According to the rules they took turns, week about, in keeping their room in order, each trying to outdo his mate in the thoroughness with which he attended to all the minutiæ of the business.
They were good-natured rivals too in other matters connected with the course of instruction they were going through: gymnastic exercises, fencing and boxing, and the drill called fire-quarters, in which the whole battalion is formed into a fire-brigade, and when the fire-bell is sounded each cadet hastens to his proper place in the troop, and the steam fire-engine and hose-carriages belonging to the Academy are brought out and used as they would be in case some building were in flames and the cadets were called upon to assist in extinguishing the blaze.
Max and his chum had become quite expert at that exercise, when one night they were roused from sleep by the sound of the fire-bell, and springing up and running to their window saw that a dwelling several squares from the Academy was in flames.
"It's a real fire this time!" cried Hunt, snatching up a garment and beginning a very hurried toilet, Max doing the same, "and now we'll have a chance to show how well we understand the business of putting it out."
"And we must try to do credit to our training here in the Academy," added Max.
An hour or more of great excitement and exertion followed, then, the fire extinguished, the brigade returned to the Academy, and the lads to their sleeping-room, so weary with their exertions that they were very soon sound asleep again.
The experiences of that night furnished Max with material for an interesting letter to his father and the rest of the home folks.