ow up a culvert and block a whole line so that
precious hours might be lost in getting troops aboard a transport. One man
could blow up a waterworks or a gas tank or cut an important telegraph or
telephone wire!"

"You mean that there will be Germans here trying to hurt England any way
they can, don't you, sir?" asked Harry Fleming.

"I mean exactly that," said Grenfel. "We don't know this--we can't be sure
of it. But we've got good reason to believe that there are a great many
Germans here, seemingly peaceable enough, who are regularly in the pay of
the German government as spies. We don't know the German plans. But there
is no reason, so far as we know, why their great Zeppelin airships
shouldn't come sailing over England, to drop bombs down where they can do
the most harm. There is nothing except our own vigilance to keep these
spies, even if they have to work alone, from doing untold damage!"

"We could be useful as sentries, then?" said Leslie Franklin. He drew a
deep breath. "I never thought of things like that, sir! I'm just beginning
to see how useful we really might be. We could do a lot of things instead
of soldiers, couldn't we? So that they would be free to go and fight?"

"Yes," answered the scoutmaster. "And I can tell you now that the National
Scout Council has always planned to 'Be Prepared!' It decided, a long time
ago, what should be done in case of war. A great many troops will be
offered to the War Department to do odd jobs. They will carry messages and
dispatches. They will act as clerks, so far as they can. They will patrol
the railways and other places that ought to be under guard, where soldiers
can be spared if we take their places. So far as such things can be
planned, they have been planned.

"But most of the ways in which we can be useful haven't showed themselves
at all yet. They will develop, if war comes. We shall have to be alert and
watchful, and do whatever there is to be done."

"Who will be scoutmaster, sir, if you go to the war?" asked Harry.

"I'm not quite sure," said Grenfel. "We haven't decided yet. But it will be
someone you can trust--be sure of that. And I think I needn't say that if
you scouts have any real regard for me you will show it best by serving as
loyally and as faithfully under him as you have under me. I shall be with
you in spirit, no matter where I am. Now it's getting late. I think we'd
better break up for to-night. We will make a special order, too, for th