can’t see it on account of buildings, but most always you can see it. If you could have a string from my porch to that tree, the string would be right over Bridgeboro and the river and Little Valley and that other small hill. So now you know just how it is. From my porch to that tree is about seven miles as the crow flies, and believe me the crows have it easy compared to the boy scouts.

So now our troubles begin. If you want to follow us, all right, it’s up to you. I should worry. We have troubles of our own.

The next morning we started from my porch. We reminded ourselves of the Pilgrims and Christopher Columbus and a lot of other people you meet in school. Our young hero, P. Harris, was all decorated up like a band wagon, belt-axe, badges, compass, cooking set, a big coil of rope and the horn part of a phonograph. He had that hanging over his back like a soldier’s pack. The only thing he forgot to bring was the player piano from his house.

“What’s that phonograph horn for?” Westy asked him.

“It’s to use as a megaphone,” he said. “Suppose we want to—to—shout for a——”

“House to get out of the way?” I said.

“You never can tell when we may want to use it,” he said.

“I’m sorry I didn’t bring my mother’s sewing machine along,” Dorry said.

“We don’t need that with this kid along,” I said. “We’ll have enough stitches in our sides from laughing.”

“We ought to have some mothers and sweethearts and things to weep when we start off,” the kid said.

I said, “I don’t believe I’ve got any sweethearts around the house just at present, but wait a minute and I’ll see.”

“Tell them to bring some handkerchiefs,” Westy said.

“And a couple of buckets of tears,” Hunt Manners piped up.

I went inside and called to my mother and my sister Marjorie and asked them if they could come out on the porch and weep. My mother said she was very busy but she’d come and weep for about a minute. When they came out they were crying—from laughing so hard.

Then I delivered a speech. I said to my mother and sister, “You’re supposed to keep on weeping and wringing your hands while I make a farewell speech. Don’t you know the way the wives and sweethearts did when the Pilgrim Fathers started away?”

Then I said:

“Scouts of the Silver Fox Patrol and also the raving Raven that we have wished on us, there must be no good turns on this hike. We’re going the same way the crow flies, only different. The first time we have to turn to right or left we will have to admit we’re beaten, and come home. We’ll have to turn back like somebody or other who started for some place once upon a time in the third grade history—an explorer. The battle cry is ‘ONWARD.’ If we do any good turns they’ll have to be up and down, not to right or left. Anybody that wants to stay home can do it. At five o’clock this afternoon we intend to plant the Silver Fox emblem under that big poplar tree on west ridge. We’ll start a fire there so all the world can see. That fire will mean triumph. It will mean we went in a bee-line. If we have to push Little Valley out of the way we’ll do it—it isn’t so big. We’ll cross the valley——”

My mother said, “You’d better wear your rubbers.”

I said, “Do you think Christopher Columbus and Henry Hudson wore rubbers? At five o’clock this afternoon you look over to west ridge and see what you see. We intend to go straight—it says in the handbook a scout lives straight—but we can beat that, we can go straight. We are going to go in a bee-line for that tree and take possession of it in the name of the Silver Fox Patrol B. S. A. This is the only real boy scout drive that ever happened—all others are imitations. This is the famous bee-line hike invented by Westy Martin. We’re off!”

So then we raised our banner and started out. It was a big piece of cardboard fixed onto a scout staff and on it was printed with shoe-blacking:

THE BEE-LINE HIKE OF THE
SILVER FOX PATROL. GET
FROM UNDER, EVERYBODY
AND EVERYTHING.

Our first mishap was at the end of my lawn, when Pee-wee’s garter broke and a lot of junk fell on the ground when he stooped down to fix it.

“Got a safety-pin?” he wanted to know.

I said, “Pick up your coffee-pot and things and put them in the megaphone and come ahead. Do you think we’re going to start out to conquer the world with safety-pins?”

Table of Contents

CHAPTER V

A STUMBLING BLOCK

Little we thought that inside of an hour we’d be on the road to fame. I don’t mean that we turned to the right or left to get into the road. We just kind of bunked into fame. That hike was only seven miles long but in one way it went all the way out to the Pacific coast. Maybe it’s in China by this time for all I know.

While we were going down the hill to get into Bridgeboro, Pee-wee said, “We ought to look kind of invincible, like conquerors.”

I said, “Well, as long as you’re the official junk wagon you might as well carry the standard.”

“The what?” he wanted to know.

“The standard,” I said; “that’s Latin for banner. Didn’t you ever hear of the Standard Oil Company?”

So we gave him the banner, and oh, boy, that kid did look funny, holding it up. He was scowling as if he thought he could frighten buildings out of the way. The stuff he had inside of his patented megaphone kept rattling and he sounded like a junk dealers’ convention as he tramped along.

We decided that it would be best to go into regular formation so as to look more invincible and scare the civilized civilians in Bridgeboro.

“We’ll strike terror, hey?” the kid said.

“I hope we strike a restaurant,” Hunt Manners spoke up.

“I don’t care what we strike as long as we don’t strike our colors,” I told him. “Suppose three fellows walk together, and three others behind them, and Pee-wee and I will walk ahead because I’m the leader and he’s the standard bearer. Fall in.”

“Into what?” the kid wanted to know.

“Into line,” I said. “You walk ahead with me and do as I tell you. You’re going to be courier and envoy and a lot of things. You’re my official body-guard. You’re my staff. Only don’t break your other garter. Don’t give the enemy any advantage.”

So that was the way we fixed it. I marched ahead, with Pee-wee at my side holding the standard. He was a kind of a martial band, too, on account of his aluminum cooking set rattling and jingling in the phonograph horn. He looked very severe. I guess the women and children will never forget when he passed through poor, defenseless Bridgeboro. They’re laughing yet. Talk about poor Belgium!

I marched along beside my official staff. I guess you know what I look like. You can see me on the cover of this book. That laugh is caused by Pee-wee. You can only see it, but oh, boy, you ought to hear it. Behind us came