Fantasy Football Challenge - Football Fanatics Library

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Fantasy Football Challenge presents
Young Knights of the Empire

52 of 87

accident, the motor, with all appliances, leaves the station within thirty seconds of the alarm. When I was there the alarm came that a man had been run over by a tramcar in Market Street. In a few moments a motor lorry ran out of the station equipped with lifting jacks and levers to raise the tramcar, while a second followed it immediately with stretcher and first aid appliances for the injured man. In the station were kept all the things necessary for dealing with railway accidents, for rescuing people overcome with gas, for saving people in the water, and for pumping air into them when apparently drowned; there were derricks for raising fallen horses, and fire escapes of every kind. In fact, it was fitted up and manned by thirty men, all trained and prepared to deal with every kind of accident that could well happen. Well, that's just what I should like to see done by Boy Scouts in our country towns and villages. They might make their club-room a first aid station, with as many appliances they could get together in the shape of bicycles, hand-carts, ladders, jumping-sheets, stretchers, bandages, spare harness, and with every Scout trained to deal with every kind of accident, or to form fence while others rendered first aid, and so on. There might be some way of sending round or sounding the "alarm" when an accident was reported, to bring together in a few minutes the patrol whose turn it was for duty. In this way Scouts would do most valuable work. * * * * * THE DUTCH SCOUTS. Then I went to Holland, where I saw plenty more Scouts, both at Amsterdam, Amersfoort, and The Hague; and fine, smart, clean-looking fellows they were, too. [Illustration: Most of the Amsterdam Boy Scouts carry lassoes with which they are very handy.] One thing which they did especially well was throwing the lasso. They all carried light cord-lassoes on them. These came in useful for hundreds of things, like making bridges, rope-ladders, rescuing people from burning houses, and so on. But the Scouts also used them for lassoing each other, and many of them were awfully good at it. The Dutch Scouts also had an excellent stretcher, which I think would be very useful for some of our ambulance patrols. With its help, one Scout alone could take an injured man to hospital. In the first place, it was flat on the ground, without any feet to it, so the Scout could roll or drag his patient on to it. [Illustration: THE DUTCH SCOUTS' STRETCHER.] Then it had two pairs of canvas flaps, which could lace across the patient's chest and loins, with sort of pockets for his feet, so that after the patient had been fastened on to it he could, if necessary, be stood upright. This is sometimes useful in a narrow place like a tunnel or a mine or a passage. Then, with a short chain and hook to each corner, the stretcher was slung underneath a pair of wheels (a Scout's hand-cart would do equally well), and the Scout was able to wheel his patient away. * * * * * BELGIAN SCOUTS. Before my visit to Belgium the Scouts there did grand work in helping the soldiers who had been sent to put out some forest fires. For several days the Scouts were camped with the soldiers. They supplied a line of signalling posts, by which communication was kept up with the nearest telegraph offices. They rendered first aid to a good number of soldiers who got slight injuries from burning or other accidents in fighting the flames. And also the Scouts did good work in keeping the soldiers supplied with water when it was most difficult to get. When the campaign with the bush fires was over, the military commanding officer published his very sincere thanks and praise for the good work done by the Scouts. The Belgian Scouts made a very good kind of hut for themselves. In the sketch below you see the framework of one hut, as well as the hut completed by being covered with turf sods, and a wickerwork door. [Illustration: BELGIAN BOY SCOUTS' HUT. On the right is shown the framework.] During the war, the Belgian Scouts have amply sustained the reputation won for the Belgians by the men in the fighting line. Indeed, many of the Scouts themselves, though boys, joined in the fighting. One boy,

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