ed along on a nearly straight course.

To say that these Gridley high school boys were happy would be
putting it rather mildly. There was exhilaration in every move
of this noble sport. Nor was it at all like work. The canoe
seemed to require but very little power to send her skimming over
the water.

At last Dick guided the canoe in an easy, graceful turn, heading
down the river once more.

"Now, you can try just a little faster stroke, Dave," Dick suggested.
"And make it just a bit heavier on the stroke, fellows, but don't
imagine that we're going to try any racing speed."

"Hurrah!"

"Zip!"

"Wow!"

It was great sport! Just the small increase in the stroke sent
the handsome big war canoe fairly spinning down the river.

"I never dreamed it would be like this!" cried Dave Darrin, in
ecstasy. "Fellows, I don't believe there is any fun in the world
equal to canoeing in a real canoe."

"It beats all the little cedar contraptions that some folks call
canoes!" Tom Reade declared.

"I am almost beginning to think," announced Danny Grin, "that
I'd rather go on canoeing than go home for my dinner."

"That idea would last until about half-past twelve," chuckled
Reade. "This is glorious fun, all right, but dinner has its
place, too. As for me, I want to get my dinner strictly on time."

"Glutton!" taunted Greg Holmes.

"Don't you believe it," Reade retorted. "I want my dinner right
on time so that I can get back for a longer afternoon in the canoe."

"Fellows," announced Dave Darrin solemnly, "we've got to form
a canoe club."

"Humph!" retorted Greg Holmes. "We don't want to belong to any
club where the other fellows have only the fourteen or sixteen
foot cedar canoes."

"We don't have to," Dave explained. "We'll limit the membership
to those who own war canoes like this one. In other words, we'll
be the whole club."

"What's the need of our forming a club?" asked Greg Holmes. "We're
as good as being a club already. We're always together in everything,
aren't we?"

"Still, it won't do any harm to have a regular club name for the
summer," Dick Prescott suggested.

"What would we call the club?" asked Hazelton.

"Why not call it the Gridley High School Canoe Club?" Dick demanded.

"Best name possible," Tom agreed.

"Some of the other high school fellows might get sore at us, though,"
Tom hinted. "They might say we had no right to take the high
school name."

"We won't take it for ou