It came about better than Hugh had hoped, even in his most ardent moments; for Lige not only came as a candidate himself, but managed to bring several other fellows along with him. Evidently the seed had fallen on good ground and was already bearing fruit.
Some of the scouts grumbled a little at the idea of allowing boys to join who had had such a bad reputation. Hugh, however, privately talked with these objectors, and opened their eyes as to what the mission of true scouts must always be. If they meant to be true to their colors and observe the twelve rules to which they had so willingly subscribed at the time they became members of the troop, they must ever be ready to forgive and forget an injury, when asked. They should also be quick to hold out a helping hand so as to lift others, not so fortunately situated as themselves, out of the mire.
It turned out all right in the end. Lige had it in him to be a first-class scout when once he was started along the right lines. He was a natural born leader, even if possessed of a hot temper and owning to several more faults that were calculated to give him more or less trouble all his life.
The town sat up and rubbed its eyes when one fine day during the march of the whole troop through the streets,—it was a crisp Thanksgiving morning, and they were going to attend the football game in order to root for the High School eleven,—it discovered among those khaki-clad boys, Lige Corbley, “Whistling” Smith, Andy Wallis and Pete Craig, who, only a short time before, had been looked upon as the worst set in all that region.
If they had really and truly turned over a new leaf and meant to live up to the high ideals that governed the scouts, it was evident that the city would enjoy a long period of peace.
Hugh Hardin knew very well that his duty did not end when those boys donned the honored khaki of the troop. They were bound to have an abundance of setbacks, and would no doubt come near falling into their old ways more than a few times. And so Hugh, at the suggestion of the Scout Master, Lieutenant Denmead, kept as close to them as possible, and offered such good advice from time to time that they were enabled to weather the gales that arose.
All this time the scouts had not neglected the great work they had taken upon their shoulders. But since all opposition had practically died out when Lige Corbley reformed, things went along smoothly for them.
“You see,” Hugh explained to some of the boys one day, when they were resting after having cleaned up a spot that had long been an eyesore to the ladies composing the Town Improvement Association, “this thing moves along about as you’d roll a snowball when the snow’s some sticky. It keeps on getting bigger and bigger all the while. First the storekeepers decided to stand back of us and not allow any trash to be swept out on the streets, but to have it gathered up every morning and placed in the right receptacles. Then the house-owners began to take a hand and make their places look spic and span, until now it’s nothing less than a crime to have your front or back yard harbor litter of any kind. And the town council at the last meeting passed a lot of ordinances that the ladies put up to them, so that next summer this is going to be as pretty and neat a city to live in as there is in all New England.”
“Thanks to the scouts!” remarked “Shorty” McNeil, who, although a very quiet member of the troop, was deeply interested in his hobby of photographing wild flowers and plant life in the woods and could appreciate anything that went with landscape gardening.
“If you asked me,” spoke up Alec Sands, with a look toward the assistant scout master that spoke volumes for the new and hearty feelings of friendliness he entertained these days for that worthy, “I’d amend that and put it, ‘Thanks to Hugh Hardin!’”