CHAPTER PAGE [I. What Took the Scouts up into Maine.] 3 [II. The Troubles of Bumpus.] 11 [III. A Strange Discovery.] 20 [IV. The Ignorance of Step Hen.] 31 [V. The Tell-tale Tracks.] 40 [VI. A Sheriff’s Posse.] 51 [VII. The Birch Bark Challenge.] 60 [VIII. Out for Big Game.] 69 [IX. “GOOD Shot! Great Little Gun!”] 77 [X. The Old Trapper’s Cabin.] 85 [XI. On the Wings of the Night Wind.] 96 [XII. A Face in the Window.] 106 [XIII. The Marked Shoe Again.] 115 [XIV. Figuring It Out.] 123 [XV. The Luck That Came to Bumpus.] 131 [XVI. A Little Knowledge, Well Earned.] 148 [XVII. The Coming of the Hairy Honey Thief.] 156 [XVIII. A Mighty Nimrod.] 164 [XIX. The “Whine” of a Bullet.] 173 [XX. A Wonderful Find.] 181 [XXI. The Dummy Packet.] 190 [XXII. The Night Alarm.] 198 [XXIII. A Flank Movement.] 206 [XXIV. What Woodcraft Does.] 215 [XXV. Surprising Charlie.] 223 [XXVI. The Sheriff Gets His Shock, Too.] 231 [XXVII. Down the River—Conclusion.] 240
THE BOY SCOUTS
ON THE TRAIL
CHAPTER I.
WHAT TOOK THE SCOUTS UP INTO MAINE.
“There never was such great luck as this, fellows!”
“You’re right there, Step Hen; and never will be again, that’s sure!”
“Let’s see; first, there was that silly old epidemic breaking out in our town, and forcing the directors to put up the bars in the school till after the Christmas holidays; that was a great and glorious snap for the Silver Fox Patrol of the Cranford Troop of Boy Scouts, wasn’t it?”
“But that was only a beginning, Giraffe; there were better things still headed our way.”
“Sure there were, Davy. As luck would have it, just at that same time Thad Brewster’s guardian found that it was mighty necessary he get word to a gentleman by the name of James W. Carson. He wired up to Maine, you remember, only to learn that Mr. Carson, who was a great hunter, had started into the big game country after moose, with a couple of guides, and wouldn’t be back until late in the winter.”
“Everything just worked for us, seemed like,” remarked the boy called Davy. “Thad suggested that he be sent up to follow this party, and deliver the message, and his guardian fell in with the idea right away, didn’t he, Thad?”
“I think he was only too willing, boys; because he knew we wanted to get up in Maine the worst kind; ever since our comrade, Allan Hollister here, began to tell us such splendid stories of the fun to be had in the pine woods of his home state. But go on, Step Hen, finish the story while you’re about it.”