: Roy Blakeley's Adventures in Camp by Fitzhugh Percy Keese - Camping Juvenile fiction; Boy Scouts of America Juvenile fiction Children's Book Series

@FreeBooksTue 06 Jun, 2023

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CHAPTER

TELLS YOU HOW WE GOT STARTED

Maybe you fellows will remember about how I was telling you that our troop had a house-boat that was loaned to us for the summer, by a man that lives out our way. He said we could fix it up and use it to go to Temple Camp in. It was a peach of a boat and took the hills fine-- that's what we said just to jolly Pee-wee Harris, who is in our troop. He's awfully easy to jolly, but he doesn't stay mad long, that's one good thing about him.

But one trouble, that boat didn't have any power, and it wouldn't even drift right on account of being almost square. Westy Martin said it was on the square, all right. He's a crazy kid, that fellow is. Anyway, the boat didn't have any power. Our scoutmaster, Mr. Ellsworth, said it didn't even have any will power. We couldn't even pole it.

When we first got it, it was way up a creek in the marshes and Mr. Donnelle took us there and showed it to us. Just as we were coming near it, a fellow jumped out of it and ran away through the marshes. We said he must be a tramp, because he was all ragged. Anyway, he acted as if he was scared, that was one sure thing.

"We should worry about him, anyway," I said; and Mr. Donnelle said he was gone and that was the end of him.

When we began fixing the boat up, we found that one of the lockers was locked with a padlock and as long as the boat didn't belong to us, we didn't break it open, especially because there were plenty of lockers besides that one. I bet you'd like to know what was in that locker. But you're not going to find that out yet, so there's no use asking. All the time we thought Mr. Donnelle had the key to it. But, oh, just you wait.

Well, after we got it all fixed up, we couldn't decide how we'd get it down into the bay and then up the Hudson to Catskill Landing. That's where you have to go to get to Temple Camp. Temple Camp is a great big scout camp and it's right on the shore of Black Lake--oh, it's peachy. You'll see it, all right, and you'll see Jeb Rushmore--he's camp manager. He used to be a trapper out west. You'll see us all around camp-fire--you wait. Mr. Ellsworth says this story is all right so far, only to go on about the boat. Gee, I'll go faster than the boat did, that's one sure thing, leave it to me. But after we got down into the Hudson we went fast, all right. Let's see where was I?

Oh, yes, we were wondering how we'd get to camp in it because we didn't have much money in our troop, on account of being broke. Poor, but honest, hey? And it costs a lot of money to be towed and an engine would cost a hundred and fifty dollars. Nix on the engine, you can bet. But, oh, boy, there's one thing Mr. Ellsworth said and it's true, I've got to admit that. He said that good turns are good investments--he says they pay a hundred percent. That's even better than Liberty Bonds. You don't get it back in money, but you get it back in fun--what's the difference?

One day a tug came up our river on its way up to North Bridgeboro. That's where the mill is. And there wasn't anybody there to open the bridge so it could get through. Oh, wasn't that old tug captain mad! He kept whistling and whistling and saying things about the river being an old mud hole, and how he'd never get down the bay again, unless he could get through and come down on the full tide. Oh, boy, but he was wild.

When we told him that old Uncle Jimmy, the bridge tender, had sneaked away to a Grand Army Convention, he kind of cooled down on account of being an old veteran himself, and then some of us fellows fished up an old key-bar that had been lost in the river and opened the bridge with it. That's what they call the thing you open the bridge with--a key-bar. It's like a crow-bar only different.

I'm not saying that was so much of a good turn, except it was turning the bridge around and Connie Bennett said that was a good turn. He's the troop cut-up. Anyway, old Captain Savage took me up to North Bridgeboro with him and first I was kind of scared of him, because he had a big red face and he was awful gruff. But wait till you hear about the fun we had with him when we landed and took a peek at Peekskill. Oh, boy!

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