h it and it was dandy, only in very
poor shape. It's shape was square. But I wouldn't laugh at it because we
had a lot of fun on it. Inside it had two rooms and a little kitchen and
the roof had a railing around it and there was lots of room there. There
was lots of room on the deck too. And there was a kind of little
guard-house, too, to put Pee-wee in if he didn't behave. Some of the
windows were broken, but I knew we could fix them easily. All we needed
to do was eat some green apples and then we'd have plenty of panes. There
were some lockers too, only one of them was locked and we couldn't get
into it.

I guess the tramp didn't take anything, because there was nothing
missing. I guess all he took was a look around. There were some cushions
piled on one of the lockers and they looked as if someone had been
sleeping on them.

Pee-wee said he could see the oil stove had been used by the smell--he's
got such sharp eyes that be can see a smell. I told him he had a classy
eye because there was a pupil in it, and you ought to have seen Mr.
Donnelle laugh. I guess he thought we were crazy.

"Well we should worry about the tramp," I said, "especially now that we
have a boat like this. The next thing to do is to bring the whole troop
and get her fixed up."

One thing was easy anyway. Just below Bridgeboro, where we live, there
is a kind of a branch flowing into the Bridgeboro River. We always
called it the creek. Now we found out from Mr. Donnelle that it started
along up above Little Valley. Over there they call it Dutch Creek. He
said that at high tide we could float the houseboat right down into
Bridgeboro River and then wait for the up tide or else tow it up to
Bridgeboro. Cracky, I could see it would be a cinch ark! I was glad
because we fellows didn't have money enough to have the boat carted by
land. But, good night, this way was easy.

The next morning I sent a birch bark call to an the fellows in our
troop. I sent them each a little piece of birch bark by courier. Connie
Bennett, he's our courier. And that meant come to Special Meeting--W. S.
W. S. means without scoutmaster. So pretty soon they began coming up to
Camp Solitaire. That's the name I gave the tent I have on our lawn. When
they were all there, I told them about Mr. Donnelle and the houseboat,
and we decided that we'd hike over to Little Valley and pile right in
and get it ready instead of bringing it to Bridgeboro first. We decided
that if we worke