little ceremony was gone through. Even the volatile Herc seemed impressed by the seriousness of what they were undertaking.
"And now we are blue jackets," said Ned, as they concluded and subscribed their names to the oath.
"Not yet," laughed the quartermaster. "You will now have to go to the Naval Training School at Newport as apprentice seamen."
"Only apprentices," sighed Herc. "I thought we were out of that class."
"As apprentice seamen," went on the officer, not noticing the interruption, "you will receive pay during your four months of instruction, and will be furnished uniforms and equipment free, as well as board."
He reached into a drawer.
"Here is your transportation to Newport. The boat leaves to-night at six o'clock," he went on, handing the boys some tickets. "I hope you boys, who look to be the stuff of which real seamen are made, will work hard and succeed."
"Thank you, sir. We will if effort counts for anything," promised Ned.
With light hearts the two boys made their way to the street a few minutes later. As they passed under the flag once more, Ned drew himself up stiffly and saluted.
"Why do you do that?" asked Herc curiously, as he watched his companion's action.
"Because we are now sailors under that flag in the United States navy," replied Ned proudly. "You should do the same, Herc. We're Dreadnought Boys from now on."
"All right. I will salute next time," easily responded Herc. "And now, as we have some few hours before the boat goes, let's saunter round a bit and see the sights."
As the boys, having inquired the way, started toward Broadway, they almost collided with a tall figure that was hastening into the door of the recruiting office.
"Out of my way, can't you?" the newcomer exclaimed querulously, shoving roughly by. "What are you barricading the door of the naval recruiting office for? I'll report you."
"We're here because we are now apprentice seamen in the navy, Hank Harkins," rejoined Ned, who had recognized the bully before the other had realized with whom he had almost collided.
Hank glanced angrily at the two lads, but refrained from speaking. Instead, he hurried up the stairs leading to the recruiting office, paying no attention to his country's flag.
"There goes a fine addition to the navy," sneered Herc, as the boys started off for Broadway.
"Don't say that, Herc. The navy may make a man of him," remarked Ned.
"Then it's got a fine big job on its hands, that's all I've got to say!" was the red-headed lad's rejoinder.
CHAPTER IV.
THE DREADNOUGHT BOYS HAVE AN ADVENTURE
The Rhode Island, the largest and fleetest of the big passenger vessels plying Long Island Sound between New York and New England ports, was ploughing her way through a wild, bitter night in the latter part of March, down the narrow, tempestuous passage of water dividing the mainland from the low-lying expanse of Long Island.
Although the snow swirled and the wind screamed through the vessel's funnel stays and lofty wireless aerials as if it would root them out, every window and porthole on her three lofty decks glowed with a cheerful yellow light. The lively strains of an orchestra were occasionally swirled away on the fierce wind, when the door of the main saloon swung open to admit or give egress to a passenger.
The laboring vessel had run into the storm at sundown that evening, and now, as she forged her way through the choppy seas off Point Judith, she was, despite her great size, thrown and tossed about like an empty bottle at the mercy of the seas.
As the vessel gave an unusually heavy plunge, the companion door once more opened, and in the sudden flood of light that illumined the dark decks for a brief interval, the stalwart figures of the two Dreadnought Boys were revealed. Both wore heavy "service" overcoats buttoned up to their chins, and these they secured more tightly about themselves as they faced the storm.
Both lads were heavier, even more bronzed, and keener of eye than when we saw them last. Their four months of vigorous training had, too, given them a manly air of self-reliance.
"Wow!" exclaimed Herc, as the wind hit them full and square and gave pause for a second even to their well-knit frames. "This is a hummer, and no mistake, Ned!"
"Nothing to what we'll get when we go cruising under Uncle Sam's flag," laughed the other. "I tell you, Herc, that this isn't a circumstance to the gales I've heard they get off Cape Hatteras."
"Why, what are you talking about?" rejoined Herc, pulling his cap closer over his head of bright red hair. "This wind is worse than the one that blew the roof off gran'pa's barn last New Year's eve, and that was a hummer, if you like it!"
"Still thinking of the old farm and Lambs' Corners, eh?" laughed his companion, with a hearty chuckle that sounded as if it came from the depth of his full, deep chest and excellent lungs. "Well, now that you're a full-fledged jackie, Herc, it's time to forget the stock and the barnyard, and think of the big guns and the fighting tops."
"Well, anyhow," grunted Herc, as if to change the conversation, "blowing as it is, I'd rather be out here than in that stuffy saloon, for all the lights and the music and the dressed-up ladies."
"Same here," rejoined his companion. "Crickey! that was a lurch, if you like! Hold on, Herc!" he shouted, as the other went sliding off across the slippery deck, under the impetus of the plunge. "We don't want to lose you just yet, you know. And, moreover, this is no skating rink, but a passenger steamer carrying two new-fledged ordinary seamen – "
"Blamed ordinary!" grunted Herc, in parenthesis.
"From the Naval Training School at Newport to New York, to join their ship, the U. S. S. Manhattan," went on Ned.
"Dreadnought, isn't she?" sputtered Herc, as a great, hurtling mass of spray was flung aboard by the angry wind.
"That's right. The newest vessel in the navy. We're mighty lucky boys to have got the berths."
"I agree with you," rejoined Herc, brushing his hand across his eyes, where the tang of the salt water still stung him. "I'd be altogether as satisfied as a woodchuck in a corn patch if only that fellow Hank Harkins hadn't been detailed to the same squadron. He means to give us trouble, Ned. I'm sure of it."
"I'm not afraid of any trouble that a bullying cad like Harkins can make," was Ned's brisk reply. "Anyhow, he is detailed to duty on the Illinois; and now, Herc, we've been standing here long enough. We'll take a brisk walk around the decks, to get the cobwebs out of our brains, and then we'll turn in – how's that suit you?"
"Fine," rejoined Herc, as the two young seamen started to circle the swaying decks at a good brisk pace. "I'm as sleepy as Uncle Fred's prize Berkshire after a bran mash."
Immediately on being passed at the New York recruiting office, the lads, as we know, had been ordered to report at the training station at Newport, where they had remained for the prescribed four months, being given in that period a thorough schooling in the detail work of the ordinary seaman in the United States navy. They had also gone through setting-up exercises that had, even in that short period of time, changed their physiques from the somewhat round-shouldered, slouching aspect peculiar to country boys to the smart appearance and trim get-up of Uncle Sam's sailors.
