LITMIR.BIZ

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evening, as they sat by their fire and talked.

      Alec proved to have enough stamina, at least; there was a stubborn streak in his Scotch blood that would never allow him to give up easily. Nevertheless, Lil Artha knew Alec had faults that must be corrected before he could reach that condition of excellence that all true scouts aspire to attain.

      He had a hasty temper, like most red-haired, impulsive boys, and was, moreover, a little inclined to be cruel, especially toward dumb animals. Lil Artha, himself, had once been the same sort of a chap, and could readily sympathize with Alec; but at that he meant the other should see the error of his ways, and reform. So the tall member of the Wolf Patrol took it upon himself to be a mentor; and who so well fitted for the task as a boy who had had personal experience? No one can preach temperance so splendidly as the man who, himself, has passed through the fire of unbridled passions, and learned the folly of giving way to them.

      Alec was particularly interested in the subject of the reversal of his badge. He had, of course, followed the customary habit of all scouts by fastening this to his coat in the morning in an upside-down position, until he found some opportunity for doing a good deed toward some one, which act allowed him to change its position.

      "That was easy enough at home, d'ye mind, Lil Artha," he was saying, as he rested upon his ax, and recovered his breath, "because a fellow would be a gillie if he couldnae find mony a chance to do something for sae sweet a bairn as our little Jessie. But it's going to be a harder task away up here in the wilderness, I trow."

      "Oh! I don't know about that, Alec," the other told him, encouragingly. "All you have to do is to keep your eyes about you. There are four chums around, and if at any time, for instance, you took a notion to do my stint of wood-chopping, that ought to entitle you to turn your badge over, because it would be a good deed, you see."

      Alec looked queerly at him, and then laughed.

      "But it would be depriving you of your necessary exercise, Lil Artha," he hastened to say, "and that I'd hate to do."

      "Well, seriously speaking then, Alec, there are endless ways of doing good. You needn't be confined to lending a helping hand to human beings; a boy who takes a stone out of the shoe of a limping mule is just as much a benefactor as the one who helps a poor old woman across a crowded street, or carries her heavy basket part of the way home from market. I've bound up the broken wing of a crow; yes, and I knew a scout who even helped one of those queer little tumble-bugs get his ball up a little rise, after he'd watched him fall back a dozen times, and then claim the right to alter his badge. The rest of the troop laughed at him, but the scout-master hushed them up, and said the boy was right; and that not only had he done a good deed toward one of the humblest of created things, but he had learned a practical lesson in pertinacity and never-give-upitiveness that would be of great value to him all the rest of his life."

      "Nae doot, nae doot," muttered the Scotch lad, reflectively, as though Lil Artha's interesting words had found a firm lodgment in his heart. "I can see where it is a verra interesting subject, this scoutcraft, Lil Artha. And ye ken I'm mair than glad now I took up with it."

      "And as you get to be more intimate with the little animals of the woods," continued the experienced scout, "you come to like them as brothers. We usually have a pet squirrel ducking about the camp, picking up the crumbs; and birds will come, too, if you're kind to them. All those little things help to make an outing more enjoyable, you'll find, Alec, the deeper you dip into them."

      Alec scratched his head as though he found it just a little difficult to understand; he had been raised under such vastly different conditions that it would take some time to change his habits, Lil Artha realized. Still, he liked the tenderfoot very much, and meant to do all he could to make him see things through another pair of spectacles than those he had used in the past.

      Already his lessons in handling the ax had borne fruit, and Alec gave promise of soon becoming an expert at the job. His success also gave the greenhorn a new-born ambition to excel in other branches of scout education. Lil Artha did not believe he would have much trouble in posting Alec; getting him to govern his temper, and be kind to everything that had life, would be another proposition; but constant association with such a fellow as Elmer Chenowith was bound to work a change little short of miraculous, Lil Artha had faith to believe; for he knew personally what the patrol leader was able to accomplish in his quiet, persistent way.

      "After you've finished with that log, Alec," he told the other, "we'll start our fire. I want to show you just how to go about that task, because there are a hundred things connected with making a fire that you'll find mighty interesting."

      "Ye don't say, Lil Artha? I didna ken that there was more than one way to start a blaze, which was to sticket a match to the paper, and let it go at that."

      The tall scout laughed delightedly. Really, he would find great pleasure in showing this greenhorn how many curious ways there were of starting a fire. Lil Artha had made this a sort of fad for some time past; and while several tricks were still beyond his comprehension, he had mastered a number of others; so that he could start into the woods minus a single match, or even a burning sun glass, and make a fire in any one of five different ways.

      "Oh! I can see where you've got a whole lot to learn, Alec," he told the other. "I'll promise to show you some interesting things while we're up here in the Raccoon Bluff camp. For instance, I'll make a blaze by rubbing flint and steel together, like the old Indians used to do centuries back on this continent. Then I've a little trick with a couple of sticks and some dry tinder to catch the spark."

      "Ye maun show me that, for a certainty!" cried the other, "because I've read of it in Robinson Crusoe, or some ither book of travel and adventure amang the islands of the sea."

      "Oh! there are lots of other ways for doing it in the bargain," pursued Lil Artha, now upon his most favored subject. "You'll think it a most fascinating thing, Alec, I promise you. And once you wake up to the fact that a scout can learn a thousand facts, if only he uses his eyes and his head, you'll be more than glad you joined the troop. Why, we live in a world of our own, and the poor ninnies outside don't have one-tenth of the fun that falls to us."

      "There come Rufus and George," remarked Alec. "They look unco' pleased, as if they had discovered the slashing they went to look for. I'm a little interested in survey work mysel'. Rufus is clean crazy over it, too, and sometimes his fash is all aboot theodolites and chains and compasses and the like. They told me he was lazy, but if ye seed him workin' at the business he loved, ye'd know they leed, they leed."

      Alec turned back to his work of splitting the log he had attacked. Already he had a wedge well driven into its heart. A few more lusty blows of the ax and he had opened another cleft further along, into which he was able, with Lil Artha's directions, to place a second wedge. After that it was easy to continue lengthening the split until with a doleful crack the log fell apart, having been cleft in twain.

      "That will do for now, Alec," said Lil Artha. "You have done splendidly for your first real lesson in wood-chopping, and I can see with half an eye that you bid fair to beat us all at the game, given a little time, and more experience. You've got a great swing, and seem able to hit a space the size of a dime, every time you let fall. That's half of the battle in chopping, to be able to drive true to the mark; because there's energy wasted in false blows."

      Alec looked pleased. A little praise judiciously bestowed is always a great accelerator in coaxing reluctant boys to take up their tasks cheerfully; and wise Lil Artha knew it.

      Just then Alec happened to catch a glimpse of something moving amidst the branches of the tree over his head. Lil Artha had turned aside, and did not chance to notice what the other was doing, as the Scotch lad, stooping down, snatched up a stout cudgel, and hastily threw it aloft.

      His aim must have been excellent, judging from the immediate results. Lil Artha heard him give a satisfied cry, which, however, almost immediately changed to a howl of alarm. Whirling around, the tall scout saw something that might have amused him at another time, for it possessed the elements of comedy rather than tragedy.

      Alec in hurling that stick aloft must have succeeded in dislodging some animal from its hold on the limb. The beast in falling had alighted fairly and squarely on the shoulders of the astonished Scotch boy, and given him

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