The Boy Scouts on the Trail
G >>
George Durston >> The Boy Scouts on the Trail
Pages:
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
9 THE BOY SCOUTS ON THE TRAIL
By GEORGE DURSTON
[Illustration]
THE SAALFIELD PUBLISHING COMPANY
AKRON, OHIO
Made in U. S. A.
Copyright, MCMXXI
By
The Saalfield Publishing Co.
[Illustration]
[Illustration: They sent the message quickly, accurately.]
THE BOY SCOUTS ON THE TRAIL
CHAPTER I
PLANS FOR THE HOLIDAYS
"Where are you going to spend the holidays, Frank?"
The speaker was Henri Martin, a French boy of the new type that has
sprung up in France since games like football and tennis began to be
generally encouraged. He asked the question of his schoolmate, Frank
Barnes, son of a French mother and an American father. Frank's name was
really Francois; his mother had that much to do with his naming. But he
was a typical American boy, none the less, and there was a sharp
contrast between his sturdy frame and that of the slighter French boy
who had become his best chum in the school both were attending near
Paris, at St. Denis.
"I don't really know, Harry," said Frank. "Not exactly, that is. My
Uncle Dick is coming over a little later, and I think we'll go to
Switzerland." His face clouded a little. "I--I haven't any real home to
go to, you know. My father and mother--"
"I know--I know, mon vieux," said Henri, with the quick sympathy of his
race. "But until your uncle comes--what then, hein?"
"Why, I'm to wait for him here, at the school," said Frank. "He's a very
busy man, you know, and it's hard for him to get away just any time he
wants to. He will get here, though, early in August, I think."
"But that won't do at all, Frank!" exclaimed Harry, impulsively. Like
many French boys, he spoke English perfectly and with practically no
trace of an accent. "To spend a week or two weeks here in the school,
all alone! No--I tell you what! I've an idea!"
"What is it?" asked Frank, a little amused at the horror with which his
friend heard of the notion of staying in school after the holidays had
begun.
"Why, come home with me until your uncle comes!" said Harry. "That's
what you must do. I live not so far away--not so very far. At Amiens.
You have heard of it? Oh, we will have fine times, you and I. I am to
join the Boy Scouts Francais these holidays!"
He called it Boy Scoots, and Frank roared. The word scout had been
retained, without translation, when the French adopted the Boy Scout
movement from England, just as words like rosbif, football, and le sport
had been adopted into the language. But all these words, or nearly all,
have been given a French pronunciation, which give them a strange sound
in Anglo-Saxon ears.
"Excuse me, Harry," said Frank, in a moment. "I didn't mean to laugh,
but it does sound funny."
"Of course it does, Frank," said Henri, generously. "I speak English, so
I can see that. But there's nothing funny about the thing, let me tell
you. We began by calling the Boy Scouts Eclaireurs Francais, but
General Baden-Powell didn't like it, so we made the change. Really,
we're a good deal like the English and American scouts. We have the same
oath--we call it serment, of course, and our manual is just a
translation of the English one."
"I was going to join in America, too," said Frank. "But then I came over
here, and I didn't know there were scouts here. Do you wear the same
sort of uniforms?"
"Yes--just like the English," said Harry. "You could join with me,
couldn't you? You're going to be here for a whole year more, aren't
you?"
"Yes. My mother"--he gulped a little at the word--"wanted me to know all
about France, and never to forget that I had French blood in me, you
see. My French grandfather was killed by the Germans at Gravelotte--he
was a colonel of the line. And my mother, even though my father was an
American, was always devoted to France."
"We are like that--we French," said Harry, simply. Into his eyes came
the look that even French boys have when they remember the days of 1870.
"The Germans--yes, they beat us then. We were not ready--we were badly
led. But our time will come--the time of La Revanche. Tell me, Frank,
you have seen the Place de la Concorde, in Paris?"
"Yes. Why?"
"Do you remember the statue of Strassburg? How it is always draped in
black--with mourning wreaths?"
"Yes."
"The day is coming when the black shall be stripped off!
Alsace-Lorraine--they are French at heart, those lost provinces of ours!
They shall be French again in name, too. Strassburg shall guard the
Rhine for us again--Metz shall be a French fortress once more. We shall
fight again--and next time we shall be ready! We shall win!"
"I hope so--if war comes again," said Frank, soberly. "But--"
"_If_ war comes?" said Harry, surprised. "Don't you know it must come?
France knows that--France makes ready. We shall not seek the war. But it
is not enough for us to desire peace. The Prussians are afraid of us.
They will never rest content while we are strong. They thought they had
crushed us forever in 1870--but France was too great for them to crush!
They made us pay a thousand million francs--they thought we should take
years and years to pay, and that meanwhile they would keep their
soldiers on our land, in our fortresses! But no! France paid, and
quickly. And ever since we have prepared for the time when they would
try to finish their work."
"If war comes, I am for France," said Frank, still soberly. "But war is
a dreadful thing, Henri."
"We know that--we in France," said Harry. "But there are things that are
worse than war, Frank. A peace that is without honor is among them. We
do not want to fight, but we are not afraid. When the time comes, as it
is sure to come, we shall be ready. But enough of that. There will be
no war this year or next. We have not settled about your coming home
with me. You will come?"
"I'd love to," said Frank. "If the head master says I can, I will most
gladly. But will your people want me?"
"My friends are their friends," said Harry. "My mother says always,
'Bring a friend with you, Henri.' Oh, there will be plenty for us to do,
too. We shall take long walks and play tennis and ride and shoot. Let us
settle it to-day. Come now to the office with me. We will ask the head
master."
They went forthwith to speak to Monsieur Donnet, the head of the school,
who received them in his office. The school was a small one but it
numbered among its pupils several English and American boys, whose
parents wanted them for one reason or another to acquire a thorough
knowledge of French. He heard their request, which was put by Henri,
pleasantly.
"Yes, that will be very well," he said. "I have been thinking of you,
Barnes. Your uncle has written to me that he will be here about the
tenth or fifteenth of August, and asked permission for you to stay here
until then. But--"
They waited, while M. Donnet thought for a moment.
"Yes, this will be much better," he said. "I--I have been a little
troubled about you, Barnes. If all were well, you might stay here very
well. But--" Again he paused.
"These are strange times," he said. "Boys, have you read in the
newspapers of the trouble between Austria and Servia?"
They looked startled.
"A little, sir," said Frank. "There's always trouble, isn't there, in
those parts?"
"Yes, but this may--who knows?--be different. I do not say there is more
danger than usual but I have heard things, from friends, that have made
me thoughtful. I am a colonel of the reserve!"
Henri's eyes gleamed suddenly, as they had a few minutes before when he
had talked of how France was ready for what might be in store for her.
"Do you mean that there may be war, sir?" he asked, leaning forward
eagerly.
"No one knows," said the master. "But there are strange tales.
Aeroplanes that no one recognizes have flown above the border in the
Vosges. There are tales of fresh troops that the Germans are sending to
Metz, to Duesseldorf, to Neu Breisach." He struck his hand suddenly on
his desk. "But this I feel--that when war comes it will be like the
stroke of lightning from a clear sky! When there is much talk, there is
never war. When it comes it will be because the diplomats will not have
time, they and the men with money, the Rothschilds and the others, to
stop it. And if there should be trouble, not a man would be left in this
school. So, Barnes, I should be easier if you were with Martin. I
approve. That is well, boys."
Both boys were excited as they left the office.
"He talks as if he knew something, or felt something, that is still a
secret!" said Frank, excitedly. "I wonder--"
"Of no use to wonder," said Henri. Really, he was calmer than his
companion. "What is to come must come. But you are coming home with me,
Frank. We know that much. And that is good--that is the best news we
could have, isn't it?"
"It's certainly good news for me," said Frank, happily. "Oh, Harry, I
get so tired of living in school or in hotels all the time! It will seem
good to be in a home again, even if it isn't my own home!"
CHAPTER II
TO THE COLORS
In those days late in July, France, less than almost any country in
Europe, certainly far less than either England or America, was able to
realize the possibilities of trouble. As a matter of fact, not for years
had the peace of Europe been so assured, apparently. President Poincare
of France had gone to visit the Czar of Russia, and the two rulers had
exchanged compliments. The alliance of France and Russia, they told one
another, made war impossible, or nearly so. The Emperor of Germany was
on a yachting cruise; even the old Austrian Kaiser, though required to
watch affairs because of the death of his heir, the Archduke Franz
Ferdinand, murdered by a Serb fanatic at Sarajeve, had left Vienna.
Even when the storm cloud began to gather the French government did all
it could to suppress the news. The readiness of France was not in
question. France was always ready, as Henri Martin had said. Since the
grim and terrible lesson of 1870 she had made up her mind never again to
give the traditional enemy beyond the Rhine--and, alas, now on this side
of the Rhine as well!--a chance to catch her unprepared.
What the government wanted was to prevent the possibility that an
excited populace, especially in Paris, might force its hand. If war came
it meant that Germany should provoke it--if possible, begin it. It was
willing to sacrifice some things for that. And this was because, in the
years of peace, France had won a great diplomatic victory, the fruits of
which the country must preserve. In 1870 France had had to face Germany
alone. She had counted upon help from Austria, now Germany's firm friend
and ally, but then still smarting under the blow of the defeat four
years before. She had hoped for help, perhaps, from Roumania and from
Russia.
But all that Germany, by skillful trickery, had rendered vain. She had
made France seem to be the aggressor, and France had forfeited the
sympathy of England and of Austria as a result. Alone she had been no
match for Germany. And alone she would be as little a match for Germany
in 1914 as in 1870. But she had prepared herself. Now Russia, no matter
what the reason for war, would be with her. And, if France was attacked,
England was almost sure to join her. Everything would depend on that.
With the great English navy to bottle up the German fleet, to blockade
the German coasts, France felt that she was secure. And so the
government was resolved that nothing should happen to make possible the
loss of England's friendship; nothing that should give England even the
shadow of an excuse for remaining neutral.
So what the newspapers printed of the threats that Austria was making
against Servia was carefully censored. There was nothing to show that
Austria was assuming a warlike attitude, and that Russia, the friend of
the little Slav countries in the Balkans, was getting ready to take the
part of Servia. There was nothing to show what the French government
and every newspaper editor in Paris knew must be a fact--that Austria
must have had assurance of German support, since she could not hope to
make a winning fight, unaided, against the huge might of Russia.
That was why all over France life proceeded in the regular way, calm,
peaceful, without event. Some there were who knew that Europe was closer
to a general war than since the end of Napoleon's dream of conquest. But
the masses of the people did not know it. All over France the soldiers
were active; the new recruits, reporting for the beginning of their
three years of military service, were pouring into the depots, the
headquarters of the army corps, to be assigned to their regiments. But
that was something that happened every year. In a country where every
man, if he is not a cripple or diseased, has to be a soldier for three
years, the sight of a uniform, even of a long column of marching troops,
means nothing.
And then, with the most startling abruptness, there came a change.
Nothing official, as yet. But suddenly the government allowed the real
news, or most of it, to be printed. Austria had made demands of Servia
that no country could meet! Russia had protested! Russia and Austria
were mobilizing! Germany had sent an ultimatum to Russia, demanding that
she stop massing her troops in Poland and on the borders of East
Prussia.
"It means war," said Henri Martin to Frank. Gone was the exultation of
his voice. Frank had noticed that, since the first appearance of the
really ominous news, the excitability of his French schoolmates had
disappeared. They were quiet; far quieter than American boys would have
been in the same case, he thought.
"But this is not France's quarrel," said Frank. "She cares nothing for
Servia."
"Servia? Bah! No one cares for Servia--except Austria and Russia! Servia
is only an excuse. Austria wants to get some ports and Russia wants
them, too, or wants a friendly country to have them. But I will tell
you why it means war, Frank, my friend. It is because Guillaume, their
Kaiser, thinks it is the chance to crush France!"
"Why now more than at any other time, Harry?"
"Lieutenant Marcel told me what he thinks. It is that England is having
much trouble. In Ireland there is rebellion, almost, over the home rule.
The Germans think England will be afraid to fight, that she will have to
think of her own troubles. He does not know those English, that Kaiser!
They have their quarrels among themselves. But if anyone else
interferes--pouf! The quarrel is over--until the one who interferes is
beaten."
"Yes, I believe that. We're like that in America, too. Why, right after
the Civil War, we nearly had to fight about Mexico. And the men in the
South, who had just been fighting the northern army, were all ready to
volunteer and fight for the country."
"Well, that is one reason, then. And, for another, France is getting
stronger, and Russia too. For a few years after the war with the
Japanese, Russia was weak. But now she is getting strong again, and
Austria is getting weaker. If Germany and Austria can ever win it is
now--that is what the Kaiser believes. And why must France fight? Even
if she is not attacked she must help Russia because of the treaty."
"But she didn't fight with Russia against Japan."
"Because only one country was at war against her. If England had joined
Japan, we should have had to fight with Russia against her," Henri
explained.
It was during the morning recess that they held this conversation. Now
the bell called them back to school. The class to which they went was
one that was being taught by M. Donnet himself, the head master. He was
at his place by his desk, and the boys had taken their seats. Suddenly,
just as the master was about to speak, a servant appeared with a
telegram in his hand. He took it to the master. M. Donnet tore it open
and read it, while a serious, grave look came into his eyes. Then he
stood up.
"Mes enfants," he said, his whole manner somehow changed from the one
they knew, "I am called away from you." He stood very straight now;
Frank had no difficulty, as he had had before, in imagining the
schoolmaster as a soldier. "France needs me--our France. I go to
Luneville, to be prepared to receive the brave men who will fight under
my command if--"
He stopped.
"If war shall come!" he finished the interrupted sentence. "I leave you.
No man knows what the next few hours may bring forth. The order of
'mobilisation generale' has not yet been issued. Only superior officers
are called for as yet. Perhaps I may return. If not, I shall exhort all
of you who are sons of La Patrie to do your duty. You are too young to
fight, but you are none of you too young to be brave and loyal, to help
your parents, and your mothers if your fathers are needed by the
fatherland for active service.
"You are not too young to show courage, no matter what may come. You are
not too young to keep alive the spirit of the sons of France--the spirit
that won at Austerlitz and Jena, that rose, like the phoenix from its
ashes, after Gravelotte and Sedan, when the foe believed that France lay
crushed for evermore! Perhaps you, like all who are French, may be
called upon to make sacrifices, sometimes to go hungry. But remember
always that it is not only those who face the foe on the battle line who
can serve the fatherland!"
He drew himself up again.
"Farewell, then, mes enfants!" he said. "I go to meet again those other
children I am to lead! Vive la France!"
For a moment, as he moved to the door, there was silence.
And it was Frank Barnes, only half French, who jumped to the top of a
desk and raised his voice in the most stirring of all patriotic
airs--the Marseillaise.
With a will they joined him, English, American and French, for all were
there. Slowly, still singing, they followed the master from the
class-room, and gathered outside in the open air of the school yard. And
from other rooms, from all over the school, masters and boys poured out
to join them and to swell the chorus. Outside, in the street, a passing
battalion of the infantry of the line, made up of smiling young
soldiers, heard and took up the chorus, singing as they marched.
There was no need of questions from those who heard the singing. In a
moment the discipline of the school went by the board. And, when the
song was done, they still remained together, waiting. In ten minutes, M.
Donnet appeared from the door of his own house. But now he was
transformed. He was in the uniform of his rank, his sword was by his
side; a servant carried his bags. He strode through the ranks of
cheering boys to the gate, saluting right and left as he did so.
CHAPTER III
THE CALL TO ARMS
"This does not yet mean war!"
So M. Donnet had cried, in a final word of warning, meaning, if
possible, to do his part in the government's plan, still in force, of
restraining the passions of the French people. No. It did not mean war.
Not quite. But it meant that war was inevitable; that within a few
hours, at the most, mobilization would be ordered. This was on Saturday.
And that evening Germany declared war on Russia. Within an hour posters
were everywhere. The general mobilization had been ordered.
The teachers in that school were young men. On the word they went. Each
knew what he had to do. Each had his little book of instructions. He
needed no orders. The mere fact that mobilization had been ordered was
all he needed to know. He knew already where he must report, where his
uniform and his equipment would be given to him, and which regiment he
was to join. He was a soldier by virtue of the three years, or the two,
he had spent already with the colors. He did not have to be drilled; all
that had been done. He knew how to shoot, how to live in camp, how to
march. If he was a cavalryman, he knew how to ride; if an artilleryman,
how to handle the big guns.
And as with the teachers, so it was with the other men about the
school,--the gardeners, the servants, all of them. Within an hour of the
time when the order was issued, they were on their way and the school
was deserted, save for boys and one or two old men, who bewailed the
fact that they were too old to fight. In the streets St. Denis looked
like a deserted village. All the young men were going.
Swiftly preparations were made to close the school. Madame Donnet, left
in charge when her husband went, called the boys together.
"You must get home," she said. "Here you cannot stay. There will be no
way to care for you. And soon, too, the school will be used as a
hospital. So it was in 1870. I shall stay, and I shall prepare for what
is to come. M. Donnet telegraphed yesterday to all the parents, bidding
them be ready for what has come. I will give money for traveling
expenses. And in happier times we shall meet again."
Save for the friendly offer Henri had already made, Frank Barnes might
well have been in a sorry plight. And, indeed, he offered now to let his
chum withdraw his invitation.
"I have plenty of money, Harry," he said. "And if I go into Paris, to
the American ambassador, or the consul, he will see that I am all right
until my uncle comes. Your family won't want a guest now."
But Harry wouldn't hear of this.
"Now more than ever!" he said. "It will be different. True--not as we
had planned it before this came. But you shall come, and perhaps we
shall be able to do something for France with the Boy Scouts. We shall
see. But this much is certain--I think we shall not be able to go to
Amiens at once. Amiens is in the north--it is that way that the soldiers
must go, soldiers from Paris, from Tours, from Orleans, from all the
south. It is from the north that the Germans will come. Perhaps they
will try to come through Belgium. So, until the troops have finished
with the railways, we must wait. We will go to my aunt in Paris."
And go they did to Madame Martin, Henri's aunt, who lived in a street
between the Champs Elysees and the Avenue de l'Alma, not far from the
famous arch of triumph that is the centre of Paris. At the station in
St. Denis, where they went from the school, they found activity enough
to make up, and more than make up, for the silence and stillness
everywhere else. The station was choked with soldiers, reservists
preparing to report on the next day, the first of actual mobilization.
Women were there, mothers, wives, sweethearts, to bid good-bye to these
young Frenchmen they might never see again because of war.
And there was no room on the trains to Paris for any save soldiers. The
gates of the station were barred to all others, and Frank and Harry went
back to the school.
"I know what we can do, of course," said Harry. "It isn't very far.
We'll leave our bags here at the school, and make packs of the things we
need. And then we'll ride in on our bicycles. We were stupid not to
think of that before."
That plan they found it easy to put into execution. They had meant to
abandon their bicycles for the time being, at least, but now they
realized what a mistake it would have been to do that, since with every
normal activity cut off by the war, the machines were almost certain to
be their only means of getting from one place to another, in the
beginning at least.
Mounted on their bicycles, they now found their progress easy. The roads
that led into Paris were crowded, to be sure. They passed countless
automobiles carrying refugees. Already the Americans were pouring out
of Paris in their frantic haste to reach the coast and so take boat to
England. On Saturday night automobiles were still allowed to leave
Paris. Next morning there would be a different story to tell.
In Paris, when they began to enter the more crowded sections, they saw
the same scenes as had greeted them in St. Denis, only on a vastly
larger scale. Everywhere farewells were being said. Men in uniforms were
all about. Officers, as soon as they were seen, were hailed by the
drivers of taxicabs, who refused even to think of carrying a civilian
passenger if an officer wanted to get anywhere, or, if there were no
officers, a private soldier. The streets were crowded, however, and with
men. Here there were thousands, of course, not required to report at
once.
"When mobilization is ordered," explained Henri, "each man in France has
a certain day on which he is to report at his depot. It may be the first
day, the third, the fifth, the tenth. If all came at once it would mean
too much confusion. As it is, everything is done quickly and in order."
"It doesn't look it," was Frank's comment.
"No," said his chum, with a laugh. "That's true. But it's so, just the
same. Every man you see knows just when he is to go, and when the time
comes, off he will go. Why, even in your America, now, all the Frenchmen
who have gone there are trying to get back. I know. They will be here as
soon as the ships can bring them. They will report to the consul
first--he will tell them what to do."
They made slow progress through the crowded streets. Already, however,
there was a difference in the sort of crowding. There were fewer
taxicabs, very many fewer. And there were no motor omnibuses at all.
Pages:
1 |
2 |
3 |
4 |
5 |
6 |
7 |
8 |
9