"Splendid idea," nodded the little Colonel—just as if he, the Spirit of Safety, had not thought it all out years before, and put it into the minds of men! "Do you ever have any trouble getting the men to wear them?"
"Plenty! Most of the men treated it as a joke at first. Then, gradually, they began to notice that the men who wore theirs on their hats (the rule is that they must wear goggles while at this work or lose their jobs), those were the men who lost their eyes. Several of the first men to be blinded after the new rule was posted were those very ones, the chaps that had made the most fun of the goggles. Then the others began to wake up.
"Over in my office, I've several hundred pairs of goggles that have had one or both lenses smashed by flying bits of steel—and every pair has saved an eye, in some cases both eyes. Seems sort of worth while, eh, Colonel?"
It was an enthusiastic group of Safety Scouts that passed out through the big steel mill gates and started home in the mellow September twilight. "Oh, I think it's wonderful," cried Betty, as they talked over what they had seen, "perfectly wonderful, Sure Pop, that such little things can save so many lives!"
"But I don't see why you call a trip like this 'an adventure,'" broke in Chance, who had never been along on any of the twins' Safety Scouting trips before. "We didn't see an accident or an explosion or anything!"
Colonel Sure Pop gave Chance one of his wise smiles. "That's the best part of the whole trip, as you'll see when you've been at it as long as I have. The most delightful adventure a lover of fair play can possibly have to look back on, my boy, is one just like what we've had today—a real, live adventure in Safety!"
The spirit of fair play is the very life of the Scout Law.—Sure Pop
