CHAPTER XVI
OFF ON A LONG HIKE
Jack and Pete, with a week's vacation on their hands, were puzzled asto what they should do. But Dick Crawford, anxious to get Jack awayfrom the city for a time, until things should blow over, suggested aplan.
"I heard from Jim Burroughs the other day," he said. "You rememberJim, the fellow that is engaged to Miss Benton, up at Eagle Lake?"
"Sure--she's Chris Benton's sister," said Pete Stubbs.
Dick smiled.
"You'll get over thinking about girls as some fellows' sisters when youget a little older, Pete," he said. "Then you'll remember that thefellows you know are girls' brothers. Anyhow, Jim says they're all upin camp there again, and they were asking me if some of the Scoutscouldn't go up there to see them. Why don't you make a long hike andgo up there? You could tramp it in two days, easily enough, and theweather's just right for a hike like that."
"Say, I think that would be fine!" cried Pete. "Let's do it, Jack,shall we?"
"I'd like to, if I thought we wouldn't be in the way," said Jack, hiseyes lighting.
"You won't be in the way," said Dick. "I know they'd be glad to seeyou. Come on over to Scout headquarters and we'll see what we've gotin the way of equipment for your hike."
At headquarters they found everything they needed. They made up acouple of packs for each them to carry, with a frying-pan, a coffeepot, and the other cooking utensils necessary for their two days in theopen, since they would cook their own meals and travel exactly as ifthey were in a hostile country, where they could expect no aid fromthose whose houses they passed.
"Let's take sleeping bags instead of a tent," said Jack. "I think it'smuch better fun to sleep that way. The weather seems likely to begood, and, anyhow, if it gets very bad, we can find some sort ofshelter. They're a lot easier to carry, too."
Scout-Master Durland, when he heard of the plan, approved it heartily.
They planned to ride for the first twenty miles of their journey bytrolley, since that would take them out into the real country andbeyond the suburbs, where there were many paved streets, which wereanything but ideal for tramping.
"Now we're really off, Jack," cried Pete, as they stepped off the carthe next morning. They had taken the car on its first trip, and it wasbut little after seven o'clock when they finally reached the open roadand started off at a good round pace.
"It's fine to travel on a regular schedule," said Pete. "Now we don'thave to hurry. We know just when we ought to reach every place we'recoming to, and how long we can stay. That's much better than justgoing off for a long walk."
"Sure it is! It's systematic, and it pays just as well to besystematic when you're starting out to have a good time as it does whenyou're at work. I've found that out."
"I never used to think so. When I first went to work I hated having todo everything according to rules. But now I know that it's the onlyway to get things done on time. The work's been much easier at theoffice since we began doing everything that way."
"Look at our Scout camps, Pete. If we didn't do things according to asystem we'd never get through with the work. As it is, we all knowjust what to do, and just how to do it. So it takes only about half aslong to cook meals and clean up after them, and we have lots more timefor games and trailing and swimming and things like that. It surelydoes pay."
"Gee, I hope it doesn't rain, Jack. It would be too bad if we had torun into a storm after having good weather all this time when we wereat work."
"I don't believe it's going to rain. But it ought to, really, and itseems selfish to wish for dry weather when the country needs rain sobadly."
"It's been a mighty dry summer, hasn't it, Jack?"
"Yes. These fires in the forests around here show that. They startedmuch earlier than they usually do. As a rule October is the time forthe worst fires."
"They seem to be pretty well out around here, though."
"That's because there are so many people to keep them under. But up inthe big woods, where we're going, they're likely to have bad ones, whenthey start. You see a fire can get going pretty well up there beforeanyone discovers it, and then it's the hardest sort of work to stop itbefore it's done an awful lot of damage."
"How do those fires in the woods start, Jack?"
"That's pretty hard to say, Pete. Careless campers start a whole lotof them. They build fires, and just leave them going when they getthrough. Then the sparks begin to fly, and the fire spreads."
"They ought to be arrested!"
"They are, if anyone can prove that they really did start the fire.But that's pretty hard to do."
"Don't the fires start other ways, too?"
"You bet they do! Sometimes the sparks from an engine will set the dryleaves on the ground on fire, and, if there happens to be a wind, thatwill start the biggest sort of a fire."
"Isn't there any way to prevent that?"
"Yes--but it's expensive and difficult. But gradually they're givingup the coal engines in the woods, and use oil burners instead. Thereare no sparks and hot cinders to drop from an oil burning engine, yousee, and it makes it much safer and cleaner, as well."
"How about when a fire just starts? That happens sometimes, doesn'tit?"
"Yes, and that's the hardest sort of a fire of all to control or tofind. Sometimes, when the leaves and branches get all wet, they willget terribly hot when the sun blazes down on them. Then, becausethey're wet, some sort of a gas develops, and the fire starts with whatthey call spontaneous combustion."
"They have a fire patrol in some places, don't they?"
"Yes, and they ought to have one wherever there are woods. Out westthe government forest service keeps men who do nothing all day long butkeep on the lookout for fires. Up on the high peaks they have signalstations, with semaphores and telephone wires, and men with telescopeswho look out all day long for the first sign of smoke."
"I think that must be a great life. They call them forest rangers,don't they?"
"Yes. And it is a great job. Those fellows have to know all thedifferent trees by sight. They have to be able to plant new trees, andcut down others when the trees need to be thinned out. Forestry is ascience now, and they're teaching it in the colleges. An awful lot ofour forests have been wasted altogether."
"They'll grow again, won't they, Jack?"
"Y-e-s. They will if the work is done properly. But you see thosegreat big mills, that use up thousands of feet of timber everyseason--even millions--don't stop to cut with an idea of reforestation.They just chop and chop and chop, and when they've cut all the timberthey can, they move on to another section, where they start in and doit all over again. I'm working to get a Conservation badge, you know.That's how I've happened to read about all these things."
"I'm going to try to get a Conservation badge, too, Jack. I can startworking for it as soon as I'm a First-Class Scout, can't I?"
"Yes. And this hike will be one of your tests for your First-Classbadge, too. You're only supposed to have to go seven miles, and we'llmake a whole lot more than that. How about your other qualifications?Coming along all right with them?"
"Yes, indeed. I think I can qualify in a couple of weeks."
"That's fine, Pete! You know I enlisted you, and a Scout is judgedpartly by the sort of recruits he brings into the Troop. They'll neverhave a chance to blame me for enlisting you if you keep on the wayyou've begun."
They were going along at a good pace all this time, not too fast, butswinging steadily along. The road did not seem long, because theirhard, young bodies were used to exercise, and they took the walking asa matter of course.
"They'll be expecting us up at the Bentons, won't they, Jack?"
"Dick Crawford said he would write and let Jim Burroughs know we werecoming, Pete. So I guess they'll be on the lookout all right."
"Do you remember the night we got to the lake, and Jim Burroughs andMiss Benton were lost in the woods?"
"I certainly do! They would have had a bad night of it if we hadn'tfound them, I'm afraid. But all's well that ends well. It didn't hurtthem at all, as it turned out, and I guess it taught them both to bemore careful about going out in woods when they weren't sure of thetrail."
"Gee, Jack, I could have got lost myself then. I didn't know how totravel by the stars, and I wasn't any too sure how to use a compass."
They had traveled more than half the distance when they picked out asleeping place that night. They went to a farmer's house, and when hefound that all they wanted was permission to camp in his wood lot, andto make a fire there, he told them they could do as they liked. Heinvited them to spend the night in the house, too, but they told himthey preferred to sleep out-of-doors, and, laughing at them, heconsented.
They were off at five in the morning, and at noon, when they built afire and cooked their dinner, they could see the wooded crests of thehills that were their destination rising before them.
"Look at that haze, Jack," said Pete. "That isn't a storm, is it,coming along?"
"I don't think so, Pete. I don't like the looks of it. It looks to memore like smoke, from a woods fire. I've been thinking I smelled smokefor some time, too."
"Could you smell it as far as this?"
"Smoke from a big forest fire sometimes travels for two or threehundred miles, if the wind's right, Pete. In the city, even, in thefall, there will be smoky days, though there isn't a forest fire of anysort for a good many miles."
"I suppose that's because the wood smoke is so thick."
The further they traveled, the thicker grew the smoke. There could nolonger be any mistake about it. The woods in front of them were wellalight.
"I only hope the fire doesn't reach Eagle Lake," said Jack.
Boy Scout Fire Fighters; Or Jack Danby's Bravest Deed Page 16