Boy Scouts on a Long Hike; Or, To the Rescue in the Black Water Swamps

"They all think, fellows, that the Beaver Patrol can\'t do it!" "We\'ll show \'em how we\'ve climbed up out of the tenderfoot class; hey, boys?" "Just watch our smoke, that\'s all. Why, it\'s only a measly little twenty-five miles per day, and what d\'ye think?" "Sure Seth, and what\'s that to a husky lot of Boy Scouts, who\'ve been through the mill, and wear merit badges all around? Huh! consider it as good as done right now!" Half a dozen boys who wore khaki uniforms, were chattering like so many magpies as they stood in a little group on an elevation overlooking the bustling Indiana town of Beverly. Apparently they must have been practicing some of the many clever things Boy Scouts delight to learn, for several of the number carried signal flags; two had pieces of a broken looking-glass in their possession; while the tall lad, Seth Carpenter, had a rather sadly stained blanket coiled soldier fashion about his person, that gave off a scent of smoke, proving that he must have used it in communicating with distant comrades, by means of the smoke code of signals.8 Besides Seth there were in the group Jotham Hale, Eben Newcomb, Andy Mullane, Fritz Hendricks, and a merry, red-faced boy who, because of his German extraction, went by the name of "Noodles Krafft." The reader who has not made the acquaintance of these wide-awake scouts in previous volumes of this Series will naturally want to know something about them, and hence it might be wise to introduce the members of the Beaver Patrol right here.