I afterwards took to training boys in that way, but I had not been long at it before the girls came along, and offered to do the very thing I had hoped for, they wanted to take up Scouting also.
They did not merely want to be imitators of the boys; they wanted a line of their own.
So I gave them a smart blue uniform and the names of "Guides" and my sister wrote an outline of the scheme. The name Guide appealed to the British girls because the pick of our frontier forces in India is the Corps of Guides. The term cavalry or infantry hardly describes it since it is composed of all-round handy men ready to take on any job in the campaigning line and do it well.
Then too, a woman who can be a good and helpful comrade to her brother or husband or son along the path of life is really a guide to him.
The name Guide therefore just describes the members of our sisterhood who besides being handy and ready for any kind of duty are also a jolly happy family and likely to be good, cheery comrades to their mankind.
The coming of the Great War gave the Girl Guides their opportunity, and they quickly showed the value of their training by undertaking a variety of duties which made them valuable to their country in her time of need.
My wife, Lady Baden-Powell, was elected by the members to be the Chief Guide, and under her the movement has gone ahead at an amazing pace, spreading to most foreign countries.
It is thanks to Mrs. Juliette Low, of Savannah, that the movement was successfully started in America, and though the name Girl Scouts has there been used it is all part of the same sisterhood, working to the same ends and living up to the same Laws and Promise.
If all the branches continue to work together and become better acquainted with each other as they continue to become bigger it will mean not only a grand step for the sisterhood, but what is more important it will be a real help toward making the new League of Nations a living force.
How can that be? In this way: