lp
you can give is by just being cheerful and friendly."

"I hadn't thought of that. But I'm going to try always to be like that.
Miss Eleanor, when can we be real Camp Fire Girls?"

"I talked to Mrs. Chester about that to-day, and I think it will be
to-night, Bessie."

"Oh, that will be splendid!"

"Yes, won't it? You see, it's the night for our Council Fire--that's
when we take in new members, and award honors and report what we've
done. We hold one every moon. That's the Indian name for month. You see,
month just means moon, really. This is the Thunder Moon of the Indians,
the great copper red moon. It's our month of July."

"And will we learn to sing the songs like the other girls?"

"Yes, indeed. You'll find them very easy. They're very beautiful songs
and I think we're very lucky to have them."

"Who wrote them? Girls that belong?"

"Some of them, but not all, or nearly all. We have found many beautiful
songs about fire and the things we love that were written by other poets
who never heard of the Camp Fire Girls at all. And yet they seem to be
just the right songs for us."

"That's funny, isn't it, Miss Eleanor?"

"Not a bit, Zara. Because the Camp Fire isn't a new thing, really. Not
the big idea that's back of it, that you'll learn as you stay with us,
and get to know more about us. All we hope to do is to make our girls
fine, strong women when they get older, like all the great brave women
that we read about in history. They've all been women who loved the
home, and all it means--and the fire is the great symbol of the home. It
was fire that made it possible for people to have real homes."

"I've read lots and lots of things about fire," said Bessie.
"Longfellow, and Tennyson, and other poets."

But then her face darkened suddenly.

"It was fire that got me into trouble, though," she said. "The fire that
Jake Hoover used to set the woodshed afire."

"That was because he was misusing the fire, Bessie. Fire is a great
servant. It's the most wonderful thing man ever did--learning to make a
fire, and tend it, and control it. Have you heard what it says in the
Fire-Maker's Desire? But, of course, you haven't. You haven't been at a
Council Fire yet. Listen:

"For I will tend,
As my fathers have tended
And my father's fathers
Since Time began
The Fire that is called
The love of man for man--
The love of man for God."

"