Tom entered eagerly. Mr. Thurston was seated at the large table, a mass of maps and field notes before him. “How are you on drawing, Reade?” queried his chief. “Poor, sir.” “Never had any training in that line?” “I can draw the lines of a map, sir, and get it pretty straight, as far as the mathematics of map-drawing goes,” Tom answered. “But another man has to go over my work and put in the fine touches of the artist. You know what I mean, sir; the fancy fixings of a map.” “Yes, I know,” nodded Mr. Thurston. “I can sympathize with you, too, Reade, for, though I always longed to do artistic platting (map-work) I was always like yourself, and could do only the mathematical part of it. You can help me at that, however, if you are careful enough. Take a seat at that drawing table; and I’ll see what you can do.” First, Reade stepped to a box that held map paper. Taking out a sheet, he placed it on the surface of the drawing table, then stuck in thumb-tacks at each of the four corners. “All ready, sir,” he announced. Mr. Thurston stepped over with an engineer’s field note book. “See if these notes are all clear,” directed the chief engineer. “Yes, sir; I know what the notes call for,” Tom answered confidently. “Then I’ll show you just what’s wanted Reade,” continued the chief. After some minutes of explanation Tom picked up the T-square, placing the top at the side of the drawing surface. Then against the limb of the “T” Tom laid the base of a right-angled triangle. Along this edge he drew his perpendicular north-and-south line in the upper left-hand corner. He crossed this with a shorter line at right angles, establishing his east-and-west line. Mr. Thurston, standing at the cub engineer is back, looked on closely. Tom now settled on his beginning point, and made the dot with his pencil. From that point he worked rapidly, making all his measurements and dotting his points. Then he began to draw in. The chief engineer went back to his table. After Tom had worked an hour the chief interrupted him. “Now, Reade, get up and let me sit down there for a little while. I want to go over your work.” For some minutes Mr. Thurston checked off the lad’s work. “You really know what you are doing, Reade,” he said at last. “Your line measurements are right, and your angles tally faultlessly, I’m glad I kept you back today. You can help me here even more than in the field. Tomorrow, however, I shall have to keep Rice back. He’s our ornamental draughtsman, and puts in the fine, flowery work on our maps. Here’s some of his work.” Tom gazed intently at the sheet that Mr. Thurston spread for his inspection. “Rice does it well,” remarked Reade thoughtfully. “You’ve one other man in the corps who can do the pretty draughting about as well.” “Who is he?” “Hazelton. Harry doesn’t do the mathematical part as easily as I do, but he has a fine talent for fancy drawing, sir.”