n even tame wild flowers," Roy said; "lions--dandelions and
tiger-lilies and everything. He eats them alive."

"Speaking of eating, how about the stew?" Artie Van Arlen asked.

"It has to stew for an hour," Roy said. "Somebody get out the tin
plates; be prepared, that's our motto. All the comforts of home. Where's
_your_ home?" he asked Blythe in a sudden impulse.

"Oh I'm just a kind of a tramp," Blythe said uneasily. "I guess I must
have left home before I had my eyes open."

"That was before you could walk," Pee-wee reminded him.

"The last home I was in was in New York," Blythe said. "It wasn't mine."

"I guess you're like we are," Westy said, noticing perhaps a little
embarrassment in their friend's manner, "our home is outdoors."

"And believe me, the sky has all the tin roofs I ever saw beaten twenty
ways," observed Warde Hollister. That was pretty good for a new scout.

"Roofs are all right to slide down," Pee-wee observed. "They're all
right as long as you're not under them."

"Believe me, we wouldn't have the sky over us if we didn't have to,"
said Roy. "It's a blamed nuisance when it rains. The trouble with the
solar system is there are too many stars and planets and things in it.
You can't get out into the open."

"What are you talking about?" Pee-wee retorted contemptuously.

"I'd get rid of all the stars, stationary stars, movie stars and all,"
Roy said.

"Scouts are supposed to like the stars," Pee-wee informed Blythe.

"Sure, if he had his own way he'd eat hunter's stew out of the Big
Dipper," said Roy. "A lot he knows about the stars; he doesn't even know
that Mercury is named after a thermometer."

"This bunch is crazy," Pee-wee informed Blythe.

"That's because we sleep under crazy quilts," Roy said.

Blythe just sat there laughing, the silent, diffident pleasure in his
countenance shown by the crackling, cheery blaze.

"What would you do if you didn't have the North Star, I'd like to know?"
Pee-wee demanded. "We'd be all roaming around lost in the woods, dead
maybe."

"I should worry about roaming around dead," said Roy. "Do you think I've
got the North Star?"

With a look of pitying contempt, Pee-wee turned from Roy to the more
congenial bowl, now sizzling and bubbling on the fire. "It's ready," he
said.

"Be prepared," said Roy; "each one arm himself with a tin plate and
after that every scout for himself. This is called a hunter's stew
because you have to hunt for the meat