The very next day the captain examined each scout separately. Rod was the only one who was able to pass all the tests, and had earned the money. The others felt somewhat sore because they could not ask their parents for the money, and thus go to the city with the captain. Several, in fact, were quite sulky.
"Yez needn't look like that," the captain told them. "Ye've got only yerselves to blame that ye're not ready. Ye're like too many people today who expect to get things without workin' for them. But this troop is not run on sich lines. Some day ye'll come bang up aginst another troop, and how'll ye feel if ye git licked. Why, when I asked some of you boys to tie a clove-hitch ye handed me out a reef-knot, which is nothin' more than a 'granny' knot, which any one could tie. I want yez to
