“Hold on,” called out Step-hen, “let’s start even all around. Has anybody seen my tin cup? Funny how my things are always the ones to take to hiding. Now I give you my word, fellows, I laid that cup in a safe place after we washed up the breakfast dishes this morning. And I just can’t run across it anywhere. If we’re all going to take part in that water-boiling, fire-making test I can’t enter unless I have my cup, can I? So if anybody’s trying to play a joke at my expense, call it off, won’t you, please?”

“You put it in a safe place, did you, and then forgot where that place was?” laughed Thad, who knew the weakness of Step-hen very well by this time. “Now, what’s that hanging from that little broken twig up there?”

“Well, I declare, I do remember putting it there!” cried the other, with a wide grin, as he unhooked the handle of the tin cup, and took it proudly down. “And after this, you fellows had better go easy with me. I’m learning to keep my things where they won’t get lost, understand that?”

“Yes, but write it down each time, Step-hen,” laughed Smithy.

Step-hen turned upon this new tormentor.

“Oh! Smithy,” he remarked, pleasantly, “you’re sure going to get another new suit of clothes, because there’s a measuring worm right now, crawling up your back, with his tape line working over time.”

Smithy writhed, and looked piteously at his nearest neighbor.

“Oh! please knock him off, Bumpus; and do be careful not to mash him, because you know, it would make a nasty spot. Ugh! I detest worms, and snakes, and all the things that crawl. Thank you, Bumpus; I’ll do the same for you some day.”

Smithy was getting on very well, Thad thought, considering how much he had to “unlearn” in order to make a good scout. That morning, after the dip in the lake, the boys had had considerable fun with the tidy one. They had watched him dress in his fastidious way, and before long several of them were mocking him. He brushed his clothes with a lovely brush he had brought along, and which was better fitted for a lady’s dressing table than a boys’ camp. Then he adjusted his tie before a little mirror he produced, spent a long time fixing his flaxen locks to suit him, with another silver mounted brush; and finally dented in his campaign hat with the greatest precision.

Then the boys burst out into a roar, and Smithy became aware that he had been an object of great interest to his campmates for ten minutes. He turned fiery red, looked confused for a brief time; and finally snatching off his hat, gave it several careless blows, after which he thrust it on his head in any old way.

At that a cheer had arisen from the other scouts. They seemed to understand that in a short time Smithy would have learned his lesson. The work which had taken his doting mother and maiden aunts years to accomplish, would be thrown overboard in a week, and a new Smithy arise.

Each fellow having taken his tin cup, they sought an open spot where the water boiling test could be carried out without one scout interfering with the work of the others.

Then the acting scout-master mentioned the rules governing the sport.

“I’m going to give each scout just three matches,” he remarked, “and he is put on his honor not to have another one about him. Then you will line up here, after you have each selected a spot inside the boundaries where you mean to conduct your experiment in quick-fire making. For five minutes you can look around, so as to get your mind fixed on just where you will get your kindling, and water. Then at the word you start. Now, line up here, and get your supply of fire sticks.”

After the time limit had expired the word was given. All of the patrol save the scout-master started to get busy; and it was a comical sight to see some of them running around in a haphazard way, having lost their bearings in the sudden excitement.

Bumpus was early out of the game. He did succeed in getting his cup filled with water at the lake some little distance away, but of course in his clumsy fashion he had to stumble, and spill most of it on the way to his chosen station. And as one of the rules insisted that each cup should be at least three-quarters full of water, Bumpus gave up the game in abject despair, contenting himself with watching his more agile companions, and cheering them on.

Smithy also had his troubles. He took so long to get his cup filled, actually washing it out because he discovered a few coffee grounds in the bottom, that the others were building their fires before he awoke to the fact that again had his love for neatness lost him all chance of making a favorable showing. So he too threw up the job as hopeless; but from his determined looks Thad knew Smithy would do better the next time.

This left but five competitors at work. Step-hen was doing very well, and Allan knew just how to get tinder with which to start a quick fire; but even these two could not be said to be in the same class with Giraffe.

Fires had ever been his hobby, and what he did not know about starting a blaze could be put in a very small compass. More than that, Thad noticed that Giraffe certainly had good powers of observation. During that period of five minutes when those who had entered the contest were given an opportunity to look around, Giraffe had certainly used his eyes to advantage.

While the others had hastened to the border of the lake to fill their cups with water, the shrewd Giraffe had simply stepped over to a tiny little spring which he had noticed not ten feet away, and there managed to get all he needed.

And the way he shaved that fine kindling was a caution. Giraffe was a born Yankee in that he always carried a keen-edged jack-knife, and could be seen cutting every enticing piece of soft pine he came across. Why, he had applied his match to the tinder before the others returned from the lake; and the smoke of his fire blew in their faces most enticingly.

Then he added just the right sort of bits of wood, not too much at a time, until he had coaxed his fire into doing the very best it knew how.

His four rivals were bending every energy to heat up the water in their cups, testing it now and then with disappointed grunts, as it failed to scald their fingers, when a shout from Giraffe announced that he needed the attention of the judge, as his cup of water had commenced to bubble.

“Giraffe has won, hands down,” Thad said, “but the rest of you go right on, and see how long it takes each one. Then another time you will learn to use the faculties that every fellow has just as well as Giraffe.”

When the last one had finally succeeded in coaxing his fire to get up sufficient heat to cause the water in the cup to bubble, the competition was declared closed, with Giraffe an easy winner, and Allan a fair second.

“Huh!” said Step-hen, “he got the bulge on us right in the beginning by filling his old cup, at that little spring right here, instead of running to the lake like all the rest of us did. Don’t seem fair to me, Mr. Scout-Master.”

“Why not?” demanded Thad, while the victor smiled serenely, knowing what was coming. “You all had the same chance to look around that Giraffe was given. If he was smart enough to notice that he could save time by filling his cup at the spring rather than run away over to the lake, so much the more to his credit. A first-class scout will always discover means for saving time. He will keep his eyes and wits about him to see and hear things that an ordinary person might pass right by. That’s one of the first things he’s got to learn. ‘Be prepared’ is the slogan of the Boy Scouts; but in order to get the best out of anything, a fellow has to keep awake all the time.”

“I guess that’s so,” admitted Step-hen, rather sheepishly. “Giraffe is smart, and if anybody thinks to get ahead of him he must wake up early in the morning. Just wait till we try this game a second time, and see.”

Thad was more than satisfied. He believed the lesson would not be wasted on the ambitious scouts. Even Bumpus would use more care in making haste, and look for treacherous roots that always lay in wait for his clumsy feet. While Smithy, it might be understood, would either have his cup thoroughly clean to start with, or let a few innocent grains of coffee go unnoticed.

“I don’t know why,” remarked Allan, as they were cooking a little lunch that noon; “but somehow that island over there looks mighty inviting to me.”

“Do you know,” Thad remarked, “I’ve thought the same myself, and some of the other fellows have their minds set on it. If we only had some way of getting over, I might think of changing our camp, and going across. Of course I could swim over and see what the island is like, but that wouldn’t do us any good without a boat.”

“A boat up here is something nobody ever saw, I reckon, suh,” said Bob White.

“It certainly does look cool and fine across the water there; and I suppose the bear could swim it if we chose to go; unless we made up our minds to turn the old rascal loose,” Step-hen put in.

“Say, I think myself he’d follow us, we’ve fed him so well since he came in on us,” Giraffe grumbled; for it certainly did provoke him to see a shaggy beast devouring good food that human beings could make use of. “Why, I had to get up from breakfast hungry because of him. The island for mine, if it’s going to help us get rid of our star boarder any quicker.”

“Star boarder!” mimicked Step-hen; “well, that’s a joke I take it; because all of us have got our minds made up who fills that bill, all right.”

But Giraffe pretended not to notice what was said. He did not like to have his comrades pay too much attention to his little weakness in the food line.

“How about my being rewarded for coming in first in the water boiling test, Mr. Scout-Master?” he called out. “Wasn’t there something held out as an inducement, a sort of prize, so to speak? Seems to me you said the feller that won might have the privilege of making the big camp-fire this evening; and that would be reward enough for me, I tell you.”

“That was the offer, Giraffe,” replied Thad; “and I’m going to give you that chance, on one condition only. It is that you promise not to carry a single match around with you this blessed day.”

Giraffe knew only too well what that meant, for he understood how Thad worried over his propensity for starting fires at any time the notion came upon him. He gave a big sigh, shook his head, and then handed over his matchsafe, remarking:

“Well, I reckon I’ll just have to comply with the rules; but it’s pretty hard on a feller, not to have just one match along, in case he needs it right bad. But anyhow, it’s me to build that big blaze to-night, remember, boys, and I’m going to make your eyes shine, the way I do it, too.”