Nearly all were
First Class Scouts. I was invited to hand out to them the Efficiency
Badges they had been winning.
These included quite a number of First Class, Cyclists', Firemen's,
Musicians', Electricians', Cooks', etc.
I had just said a few words to the troop of my pleasure at seeing them
so smart and so efficient, when the alarm was given that the school
buildings were on fire. A few brief words of command were given by the
Scoutmaster, and each patrol streaked off in a different direction at
a great pace. We hurried to the scene of the outbreak, and had just
time to see (in our mind's eye only) dense clouds of smoke with
tongues of flame and showers of sparks bursting from the doomed
building, while the windows were alive with terrified women and
screaming children--that is what we were picturing--when out came a
knot of Scouts running the fire-hose into position, and joining it up
from one part of the building, while from another there came a second
patrol trundling along the great giraffe-like fire-escape. Within four
minutes of the alarm the leading fireman was up on the ladder
directing the nozzle of the hose-pipe with a strong jet of water on
the windows of the (supposed) burning chamber.
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