here was a fine swing to the music, and it was
not the words that counted--it was the spirit of those who sang.

As he marched along with the others Harry noticed one thing. In a few hours
the whole appearance of the streets had changed. From every house, in the
still night air, drooped a Union Jack. The flag was everywhere; some houses
had flung out half a dozen to the wind.

Harry was seeing a sight, that once seen, can never be forgotten. He was
seeing a nation aroused, preparing to fight. If war came to England it
would be no war decreed by a few men. It would be a war proclaimed by the
people themselves, demanded by them. The nation was stirring; it was
casting off the proverbial lethargy and indifference of the English. Even
here, in this usually quiet suburb of London, the home of business and
professional men who were comfortably well off, the stirring of the spirit
of England was evident. And suddenly the song of the scouts and those who
had joined them was drowned out by a new noise, sinister, threatening. It
was the angry note that is raised by a mob.

Leslie Franklin took command at once.

"Here, we must see what's wrong!" he cried. "Scouts, attention! Fall in!
Double quick--follow me!"

He ran in the direction of the sound, and they followed. Five minutes
brought them to the scene of the disturbance. They reached a street of
cheaper houses and small shops. About one of these a crowd was surging,
made up largely of young men of the lower class, for in West Kensington, as
in all parts of London, the homes of the rich and of the poor rub one
another's elbows in easy familiarity.

The crowd seemed to be trying to break in the door of this shop. Already
all the glass of the show windows had been broken, and from within there
came guttural cries of alarm and anger.

"It's Dutchy's place!" cried Dick Mercer. "He's a German, and they're
trying to smash his place up!"

"Halt!" cried Franklin. He gathered the scouts about him.

"This won't do," he said, angry spots of color showing on his cheek bones.
"No one's gone for the police--or, if they have, this crowd of muckers will
smash everything up and maybe hurt the old Dutchman before the Bobbies get
here. Form together now--and when I give the word, go through! Once we get
between them and the shop, we can stop them. Maybe they won't know who we
are at first, and our uniforms may stop them."

"Now!" he said, a moment later. And, with a shout, the scouts cha