[#] A wind coming from a direction nearly parallel with the flight of the bullet:--the course the bullet travels through the air is called its trajectory. The expert rifleman’s test consisted in first firing ten shots slow fire from 600 yards over an embankment at the silhouette of a kneeling figure of a man with his arm raised as in shooting. Then came five shots at 500 yards and five at 400 yards at the same figure, only in this shooting it bobbed up above the butts for five seconds and might show up at any point, with five-second intervals between appearances. Next, two strings of five shots each at the "ducks," or Target F, the silhouette of a man lying, are fired at 500 yards. These "ducks" are supposed to fall over when hit, and at 300 and 200 yards the target first fired at, Target E, is pulled across the range on a track fifty yards long, in thirty seconds, while ten shots are being fired. Every hit counts one point, and the firer must make twenty-five hits out of fifty shots to qualify. Expert Rifleman badge. 1. This badge is of silver metal. For every three years of re-qualification a bar is awarded with years engraved thereon and suspended between the crossed rifles and the top bar. This is the badge won by Dick at Guantanamo Bay Rifle Range. It is a true test of the individual’s ability, where steady hand, quick eye and excellent judgment are prime qualities for its successful accomplishment, yet, in spite of his fine showing on the two previous days, Dick barely scraped through with the exact number of hits to win out. But he had won, and two months later when the little silver emblems were received from Headquarters, it was with mingled pride and thankfulness he saw his own name neatly engraved on the reverse of the pin which Sergeant Douglass handed over to his keeping. Five new experts, eleven sharpshooters and four marksmen was the final result of Sergeant Battiste’s course of training. "Well, I don’t believe," Dick remarked as he strained his eyes to see the bright new badge he had pinned to his khaki coat preparatory to Saturday morning inspection, "that I’ll ever have as much pleasure in winning anything as I had in winning this, my first real medal." "You may be right, Dick," said Henry, looking a little regretfully at the new sharpshooter’s badge he held in his hand, "but what appeals more to me is that extra pay these little silver gadgets bring in each month." CHAPTER XI A REPUBLIC IN DISTRESS Christmas and the New Year’s holidays passed by uneventfully, and the _Denver_ still remained at anchor in Guantanamo Bay. Other vessels arrived and departed, but no orders came for the cruiser, much to the disappointment of all hands.