John Goldfrap - The Boy Scouts at the Panama-Pacific Exposition

“Seems to me, Rob, I ought to know that old tub of a motorboat we’re overhauling.”

“Why, yes, Andy, it’s Captain Jerry Martin’s Sea Gull . Time was when she had a reputation for speed, but her engine is a back number now.”

“Huh! that must have been away in Noah’s time, I reckon, Rob. Why, we could make circles around her, if we chose to drive our little Tramp to the limit.”

“As we happen to be in no hurry to-day, there’s no use making the old skipper feel that his boat is down and out. With vacation opening up before us, I’ve been trying to settle on some scheme for the scouts of the Eagle Patrol to have a rousing good time this summer.”

“Well, I know where I’d be if I had the cold cash to pay my expenses; and, Rob, chances are you feel the same way about it.”

“Now, I suppose you’re thinking of Tubby Hopkins’ great good luck in having his uncle, Dr. Mark Matthews, the famous globe-trotter, carry him off three days ago for an extended trip to the big show out in California?”

“Just what was on my mind, Rob. I don’t believe I ever wished so much for anything as a chance to hike away out to the Pacific. Nothing comes my way any more, seems like. Some of us scouts were lucky enough to have our turn down in Mexico that time Tubby’s uncle was taken sick, and couldn’t get there to meet his old friend, General Villa, so as to dispose of the cattle on his ranch before they were stolen by the raiding Mexican rival armies. How the rest of the boys envied us that glorious trip, Rob!”

“I admit it was a rare streak of good fortune to have things come our way as they did,” the boy named Rob remarked, as he gave a slight turn to the wheel of the bustling little motorboat, aboard which he and Andy were the sole passengers. “We ran up against quite an interesting bunch of experiences, you remember, Andy, that none of us will ever be apt to forget.”

“As if that wasn’t enough fun for Tubby and Merritt and you,” continued the boy called Andy at the wheelsman, “it came about that you all got a chance to go across the water to England and Belgium late last summer on an important mission for Merritt’s family, and saw a heap of what was going on in the fighting zone where the Germans are up against the armies of France, Belgium and Great Britain.” 1 1 See “The Boy Scouts on Belgian Battlefields,” also “The Boy Scouts with the Allies in France.”

“We’ve shaken hands with ourselves dozens of times since, I give you my word, Andy, on account of that fine streak of luck. Yes, we did encounter a whole lot of remarkable adventures over there, and saw sights we’ll never forget. Some of them I wish I could put out of my mind, because they were mighty unpleasant. But that page is turned down, Andy; and now the next thing to consider is what we are going to do this summer to make the time pass happily.”

“Oh! I suppose I shouldn’t complain,” Andy Bowles continued, trying to smile away the discontented frown that had settled across his forehead. “Here, in this good old Long Island town of Hampton, there are lots of ways a pack of lively up-to-date Boy Scouts can have good times during vacation. With the big bay at our doors, and a bully little motorboat like this to go fishing or cruising in, there’s no reason for us not to be hustling most of our spare time.”

“Yes,” Rob Blake went on to add, wishing to soothe the ruffled spirit of his comrade, “and you know what glorious camping trips we can have with a lot of the boys, just as we used to in other summers. There is the full Eagle Patrol, except our fat chum, Tubby, who’s gone to see the sights of the Panama-Pacific Exposition, and Merritt Crawford, who expects to be away for a month and more with his folks.”

“Besides,” continued Andy Bowles, as though the fact gave him more or less solid satisfaction, “all the other patrols are full – eight each in the Hawk, the Black Fox and the Badger, with a new one forming in the bargain. Boy Scout activities are at flood-tide around Hampton these days.”

“One reason for that, I take it,” mused the skipper of the little Tramp , “is the fact that through our activities in the past we have managed to keep our troop in the public eye, more or less. People know what the Eagles have done, and on the whole they favor their boys joining the newer patrols. There’s been a big change in the young fellows of Hampton, I’m told, since this Boy Scout movement first came to town.”

When the young leader of the Eagle Patrol made this modest assertion, he certainly hit the truth squarely on the head. During the last two years the members of the Eagle Patrol had made a name for themselves in Boy Scout annals – as the new reader will find out for himself if he cares to read the earlier books of this fascinating series.

Among other things they had, through a happy chance, become associated with certain scientific gentlemen connected with the United States Government, who were experimenting with a new and secret model for a big airship patterned somewhat after the famous Zeppelins of the Germans.

On another occasion they had been enabled to assist in saving the design of a wonderful submarine, also intended for the use of the Government, and the secret of which it appeared was coveted by emissaries of a nation supposed to be hostile to the United States, and desirous of learning all about such an important discovery that was apt to play an important part in future ocean warfare.

Some of the scouts later on were given a chance to pay a visit to the wonderful canal that was then being dug across the Isthmus – at Panama; and the record of how they made themselves exceedingly useful while down there will always be a bright page in the history of the Hampton Troop.

Mention has already been made by Andy Bowles, the bugler of the troop, of the trip to Mexico, with its attendant adventures; and also of the foreign tour undertaken by several of the Eagles on the previous summer, just when hostilities had broken out between the nations of Europe; and Belgium, where they were compelled to visit, was torn from end to end with the mad struggles of warring factions.

Yes, surely the Eagles could rest upon their laurels from this time on, and history would accord them the laurel wreath as the most enterprising patrol known to the Boy Scouts of America.

Still, what boy is ever satisfied with what has happened in the past? The present and the near future is what engages his attention and excites his interest. Even sensible Rob Blake secretly sighed when he contemplated having to put in the whole summer around the home town while Tubby Hopkins was having such a glorious time out there on the Coast; and his other chum, Merritt Crawford, was up in Canada with his folks at a camp.

It was a beautiful and warm day in the early summer. The sun shone from an unclouded sky, but there was enough sea breeze to fan their heated brows, and to make them think that there could be few things equal to being in a speedy little motorboat, spinning over the surface of that lovely land-locked bay, with the ocean booming on the outer edge of the sandy strip to the south.

They could have quite an extended view from far out in the bay, with the houses scattered along the shore, and the white sails of pleasure craft or fishing and clamming boats dotting the water far and near.

Just ahead of them the old launch that had seen better days was churning up the water with its noisy propeller, though not making remarkable headway at that. As the two scouts gradually drew up on the Sea Gull , they made out that besides the ancient skipper there was just one passenger aboard.