bow is too near the
stern. If we were sardines instead of boy scouts, it would be all right,
but you see there's twenty-four of us altogether, not counting Captain
Kidd, our mascot--he's a parrot.

So I got up and said, "How are we going to crowd twenty--four growing
boys and a parrot into a twenty foot launch?"

"It can't be did," Doc Carson shouted. "Then some of us will have to
hike it on our dear little feet," I said.

"Or else we'll have to get a barge or something or other and tow it,"
Artie Van Arlen said.

"What, with a three horse-power engine?" somebody else shouted.

"You can bet I won't be one of the ones to hike it," Pee-wee yelled;
"I'll dope out some scheme or other."

And believe me, he did.

Well, after we'd been talking about an hour or so on how we'd manage it,
Mr. Ellsworth, our scoutmaster, up and said there was plenty of time for
that as long as we were not going to camp for a couple of weeks anyway,
and that we'd better begin thinking of how we were going to start about
collecting books for soldiers.

All the while I had something very important to or say, and I was kind of
trembling, as you might say, "for I thought maybe Mr. Ellsworth wouldn't
like the idea. Anyway I got up and began:

"The author that wrote all about 'Tom Slade's adventures in the World
War'," I said, "told me it would be a good idea for one to write up our
troop's adventures and he'd help me to get them published."

Then up jumped Pee-wee Harris like a jack--in--the--box.

"What are you talking about?" he shouted; "don't you know you have to
have a command of language to write books? You're crazy!"

"I should worry about a command of language," I told him. "Haven't I
got command of the Silver Fox Patrol? Anybody who can command the Silver
Fox Patrol ought to be able to command a few languages and things. I
could command a whole regiment even," I kept up, for I saw that Pee-wee
was getting worked up, as usual, and all the fellows were laughing,
even Mr. Ellsworth.

"If you could command a division," Westy Martin said, in that sober
way of his, "you ought to be able to command English all right."

"I can command any kind of a division," I shouted, all the while
winking at Westy, "I can command a long division or a short division or
a multiplication or a subtraction or a plain addition."

"What are you talking about?" Pee-wee yelled.

"You're crazy!"

"I can command anything except Pee-wee Harris's temper,"