It was towards the middle of the second term of the camp that the sports took place. For days before, the boys were at work cleaning the camp up, and the cooks—two of the 251 boys—were busy getting the lunch ready. To the sports all the friends and relations of the boys were invited, and there were usually many grown people present. There was a game at baseball, some sets at tennis; there were sailing, rowing, and paddling matches, swimming and diving contests, foot races, and the like. The prizes were simple enough, bits of ribbons with the name of the camp, the contest, and the date painted on, yet they were valued very highly. Splendid work the boys did in these sports, and conclusive was the evidence of their thorough training during the summer. Those who attended the sports once were always glad to come again, for long as the days were, they were filled with fun and frolic. In the evening the boys and their visitors gathered around the great fireplace in the dormitory building, and there, in the light of the camp fire, joined in the camp songs. The last song of all was “The Battle Hymn of the Republic,” the verses being sung as a solo, and the chorus by everyone present; and it was with the grand old melody still ringing in their ears that the guests took the boats which carried them home.
There was one prize awarded at the sports which might come to any boy. This was the “C. C.” pin in silver. Those who won it were the boys who had in their own way shown themselves to have got the greatest good out of the camp, and who had done the most good to others. The pins were not common; two or three, perhaps, were given in a summer, and sometimes none at all. It is most difficult to define the conditions under which the pin was given; it came as the result of a unanimous feeling in the faculty that it had been won, rather than as the result of rules obeyed. A conscious effort to win it was enough to prevent success. The boy had to show the manliness, justice, truth, conscientiousness in him, not for reward, but because he had them in him; and then the reward, or rather the recognition, came. Intrinsically these little pins 252 are worth nothing; but those who have them value them as they value few things, and they are right.
The cruise which marked the end of the summer’s camp life was one of the most picturesque things imaginable. An ox-cart with four oxen carried the blankets, dishes, and stores; Porgus, the great, slobbering bloodhound, was fastened to the rear axle, the Infant—the youngest boy in camp—mounted the donkey, and with faculty and boys on foot, the camp set out. The routes taken during the nine cruises included all the best known roads in the White Mountains. Generally, those boys who wished to made up a separate party, and climbed some one of the great peaks, while the rest confined themselves to lower levels. At night they all slept in some barn. The routine work of the cooks and crews went on as usual, and the whole thing was pick-nicking on a grand scale. Sometimes the ox-cart would stall, or the oxen be unable to haul it up a hill, and then the rope was fastened on, and the whole camp toiled on and pulled. It was an experience to pass them at this time, to listen to the orders of the strokes, to hear the chaff flying back and forward, and to watch the crowd, all clad in gray knickerbockers and jackets, gray stockings and flannel shirts, and wearing the scarlet knit Scotch caps which completed the camp uniform.
There is a story about Porgus, the big bloodhound, which is worth telling. When they first got him everyone supposed he was exceedingly fierce, and, lest he should bite, he was tied up on another island, and his food taken to him twice a day. Suddenly, one day, Porgus was seen swimming towards Chocorua, and, the alarm being given, everyone except the man who knew him took refuge in the house. The dog was taken back and tied up, but as he could gain nothing by howling he broke away once more. The fact of the matter was, that Porgus was lonely, and that so far from being 253 fierce, he was one of the most good-natured beasts in the world. This having been found out, he was added to the list of camp pets. These at various times included a flying squirrel that had a habit of jumping on your shoulder as you passed his tree; a black sheep called Billy, who learned to butt anyone in the neighborhood; the donkey, and the kyuse—the latter a mustang pony. All of these in their time were important members of the camp. Old Captain Cairns, too, a man who lived alone in a most curious house on one of the islands, was one of the greatest friends of the boys, and always came to the sports. The captain was a curiosity in his way, and he never got tired of telling yarns about the places he had been to or the people he had seen.