" he
said; "so we'll consider that part settled. We'll meet here, then,
next Saturday morning at half past eight, prepared to put in a strenuous
day. I'll tell the different patrol-leaders what tools are needed, and
they can look them up during the week. There's another thing. We'll
have to buy considerable material, such as cement, boards for the floor
and roof, window- and door-casings, and the like. That money should be
earned by the troop, and I think it would be a good plan for Ward,
MacIlvaine, and Phelps to meet at my house to-morrow afternoon or
evening to discuss ways and means. Is that agreeable?"

It proved to be, when the question was put to vote and decided
unanimously in the affirmative. The meeting ended with the enthusiasm
over the project unchecked by this placing of it on a strictly methodical
and businesslike basis.

That enthusiasm continued throughout the week, and when the crowd
assembled on Saturday, Bennie Rhead, who was housed by a bad cold,
was the only absentee. The others, laden with axes, saws, hatchets, an
adz or two and some wide wood-chisels until they resembled a gang of
pioneers, were in high spirits and eager to begin work. Their interest
was heightened by the production of a plan Mr. Curtis had drawn up,
showing a cabin twenty by sixteen feet, with a big stone fireplace
opposite the door, two windows, and a double tier of bunks, one on each
side of the entrance.

During the week the scoutmaster had gone over the ground with Mr.
Grimstone and marked certain trees which were to be taken out, mainly
white pines from six to eight inches in diameter that were too closely
crowded to develop properly, so there was no delay in starting work.
Immediately on reaching the point, the entire troop was divided into
groups of three or four, each under the leadership of a boy who knew
how to handle an ax. As soon as he felled a tree the others trimmed off
the scanty limbs, sawed it into proper lengths, and stacked these up in
piles on either side of the glade.

By noon the piles had assumed such proportions that after luncheon half
of the wood-cutters were called off and set to notching the ends of
the log, about eight inches from the end, and this was work in which
everybody could take part. The notches were made on opposite sides of the
log, about eight inches from the end, and were a quarter the thickness of
the timber in depth. The logs averaged pretty much the same diameter, so
that, when f