Читать книгу Scouting for Boys - Robert Stephenson Smyth Baden-Powell Baron Baden-Powell of Gilwell - Страница 13

A good example of what a Boy Scout can do is to be found in Rudyard Kipling's story of "Kim."

"Kim," or, to give him his full name, Kimball O'Hara, was the son of a sergeant of an Irish regiment in India. His father and mother died while he was a child, and he had been left to the care of an aunt who lived in an humble way in India.

His playmates were all natives, so he got to talk their language and to know their ways better than any European. He became great friends with an old wandering priest who was tramping about India, and with whom he travelled all over the north part of that country. At last, one day he chanced to meet his father's old regiment on the line of march, and in visiting the camp he was arrested on suspicion of being a thief. His birth certificate and other papers were found on him, and the regiment, seeing that he had belonged to them, took charge of him, and started to educate him. But whenever he could get away for holidays he dressed himself in Indian clothes, and went again among the natives as one of them.

After a time he became acquainted with a Mr. Lurgan, a dealer in old jewellery and curiosities, who, owing to his knowledge from dealing with natives, was also a member of the Government Intelligence Department.

[Explain this.]

This man, finding that Kim had such special knowledge of native habits and customs, saw that he would make a useful agent for Government Intelligence work, that is, a kind of detective among the natives. But, first of all, before employing him, he put him to one or two tests to see whether he was sufficiently brave and strong-minded.

As a trial of his strong-mindedness he attempted to mesmerise him, that is to say, he tried to make Kim's thoughts obey what was in his own mind. It is possible for strong-minded men to do this with those of weaker mind. The way he attempted it was by throwing down a jug of water so that it smashed to pieces; he then laid his fingers on the boy's neck, and wished him to imagine the jug mended itself again. But, do what he would to make his thought reach the boy's brain, he failed; Kim saw the jug was broken, and would not believe it was mended, although at one time he nearly obeyed him, for he saw a kind of vision of the jug being mended, but it faded away again.

Most boys would have let their mind and eyes wander, and would not have been able to keep them on the one subject, and would so have easily become mesmerised by the man.

Lurgan, finding him strong-minded and quick at learning, then gave him lessons at noticing small details and remembering them, which is a most important point in the training of a scout—it is a thing that he should learn and be practising every hour of the day wherever he may be. Lurgan began it with Kim by showing him a tray full of precious stones of different kinds—he let him look at it for a minute, and then covered it with a cloth, and asked him to state how many stones and what sort were there. At first he found he could only remember a few, and could not describe them very accurately, but with a little practice he soon got to remember them all quite well. And so, also, with many other kinds of articles which were shown to him in the same way.

Then Kim travelled about the country a great deal with a fine old Afghan horse-dealer to whom he was much attached, who was also an agent of the Intelligence Department. On one occasion Kim was able to do him a good turn by carrying an important message for him secretly; and another time he saved his life by overhearing some natives planning to murder him when he came along. By pretending to be asleep and then having a nightmare which caused him to move from his position, Kim got away from the neighbourhood of the would-be murderers, and was able to give warning to his friend in good time.

At last he was made a member of the Secret Service, and was given a secret sign—namely, a badge to wear round his neck and a certain sentence to say, which, if said in a peculiar way, meant he was one of the service. Scouts generally have secret signs by which they can communicate with each other.

The members of the Intelligence Service are very numerous in India, and do not know each other by sight, so they have to have a secret sign by which they will recognise each other among other people who may be their enemies.

Once when travelling in the train Kim met another member whom he did not know. This was a native, who when he got into the carriage was evidently in a great state of alarm, and was rather badly cut about the head and arms. He explained to the other passengers that he had met with an accident from a cart whilst he was driving to the station, but Kim, like a good scout, noticed the cuts were sharp and not grazes such as you would get by falling from a cart, and so did not believe him. While the man was tying up a bandage over his head, Kim noticed he was wearing a locket like his own; so Kim let his own be seen. Directly the man saw it he brought into conversation some of the secret words, and Kim answered with the proper ones in reply. So then the stranger got into a corner with Kim and explained to him that he was carrying out some secret service work, and had been found out and hunted by some of the enemies of the Government who had nearly killed him. They probably knew he was in the train and would therefore telegraph down the line to their friends that he was coming. He wanted to get his message to a certain police officer without being caught by the enemy, but he could not tell how to do it if they were already warned of his coming. Kim thereupon hit upon the idea of disguising him.

Kim disguising the native spy.

In India there are a number of holy beggars who go about the country. They wear next to no clothing and smear themselves with ashes, and paint certain marks on their faces; they are considered very holy, and people always help them with food and money. So Kim made a mixture of flour and wood ashes, which he took from the bowl of a native pipe, and he undressed his friend and smeared these all over him, and finally, with the aid of a little paint-box which he carried, he painted the proper marks on the man's forehead. He smeared the man's wounds with flour and ashes, partly so as to heal them, and also so that they did not show; and he brushed his hair down to look wild and shaggy like that of a beggar, and covered it with dust so that the man's own mother would not have known him. Soon afterwards they got to a big station where on the platform they found the police officer to whom the report was to be made. The imitation beggar pushed up against him and got abused by the officer in English; the beggar replied with a string of native abuse into which he introduced the secret words. The police officer, although he had pretended not to know Hindustani, understood it quite well, and at once recognised from the secret words that this beggar was an agent; and so he pretended to arrest him and marched him off to the police-station where he could talk to him quietly. It was thus done without anyone on the platform knowing that they were in league with each other, or that this native beggar was the escaped Intelligence agent.

Finally, Kim became acquainted with another agent of the department—an educated native or Babu as they are called in India—and was able to give him great assistance in capturing two Russian officers who were acting as spies against the British on the north-west frontier of India.

[Note.—Point out on map respective positions of British and Russians.]

The Babu pretended to the Russians that he was the manager for a local native prince who did not like the English, and travelled with them for some time as representative of this prince. In this way he got to know where they kept their secret papers in their baggage. At last he got up trouble between them and a holy priest, whom they struck; this caused great excitement among the natives, who rushed off with the baggage and got lost in the darkness. Kim, who was among the natives, opened the luggage and found the secret papers which he took out and carried to headquarters.

These and other adventures of Kim are well worth reading, because they show what valuable work a boy scout could do for his country if he were sufficiently trained and sufficiently intelligent.