Savage all the way up to North Bridgeboro.
That's one thing I sure know--the channel. Anyway, if you don't know it,
follow the abrupt shore. But with a tug-boat, good night, you have to be
careful because a tug 'draws so much water. He was going up there after a
lumber barge, he said.

First, he didn't say anything, only smoked, and it was like a fog in
there. Pretty soon he said: "So you youngsters don't take nuthin' fer
services, huh?"

"We have to do a good turn if we see a chance," I told him.

Then he wanted to know all about the scouts, how they were divided into
troops and patrols and everything, and after I told him all that, we got
to talking about our vacation and about Temple Camp, and especially about
the house-boat. I asked him if he thought a three horsepower engine would
drive the house-boat up the Hudson, so we could get as far as Catskill
Landing in a couple of weeks.

He said, "It would be more like a couple of years, I reckon."

"Good night!" I said, "if it takes us two years to get there and we have
to be home inside of a month, I see our finish. I suppose it costs a lot
of money to get towed."

He said, "Wall now, whin I bring in a Cunarder and back her into her
stall, it stands them in a few pennies."

"You said something," I told him.

"'N I don't suppose your troop has got as much money as the Cunard
Line," he said.

"Gee, we've only got about four dollars now," I told him; "I suppose
we couldn't get towed as much as a mile for that, hey?"

"Wall, four dollars don't go as far as it used ter," he said; "maybe
it would go a half a mile."

Then he, didn't say anything, only puffed and puffed and puffed on his
pipe, and kept looking straight ahead of him, and turning the wheel
ever so little. After a while he said there wasn't water enough in our
river to drown a gold fish, and he didn't know why we called it a river
at all. He said he couldn't imagine what the tide was thinking about to
waste its time coming up such a river. He said if a bird took a drink in
the river while he was upstream, it would leave him on the flats. He was
awful funny, but he never smiled.

Illustration #5

"Roy dived after the key-bar"

When we got up to the mill at North Bridgeboro, he got the barge and
started downstream with the barge alongside. All the while he kept
asking me about the scouts, and I told him about Skinny, and how we
were going to take him up to Temple Camp with us, so he could get
bett