Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1912-10-24
Mounted Boy Scouts.

Curtis Guild, American ambassador
to st. Petersburg, wants to see noun
ted boy scouts. He believes the United
States Government should furnish
ponies for the boys, give them instruc-
ton in horseback riding and train
then in skill in riding and develop
their hardness.
He outlines his scheme in a letter to
the State Department. which has
been referred to james E. West, chief
scout executive of the Boy Scouts of
America. West is enthusiastic over
the scheme. The scout leaders are
taking the matter up with Ambassa-
dor Guild and the officials in Washing
ton. 1t is hoped that the scheme can
be developed.
Ambassador Guild got his inspira-
ton from seeing seventy Cossack
bows drill before the car last spring.
AT recent events" he writes. lin the
presence of the Emperor of Krasnoe
Selo, there was one thing of particu-
lar Importance as it opened new
vista of the possibilities of the Boy
Scout movement.
Early in May some Cossaek boys,
ranging in age from eleven to four
teen years, left their stanitzas Co.'S
sack villages,) and about the end of
the month, assembled mounted at Lep-
sinsk under a eornet. All the boys
were mounted on small and rough but
hardy ponies, and they left this town
in the province of Semirietchiye in
Turkestan, marched over 500 miles
across country of Kabul Sal on the
Tashkent Railroad, where they en-
trained for St Petersburg toward the
end of July.
Arriving at St. Petersburg this
small sotnia of about seventy boys
rode around the city seeing the sights
for several days, and they were then
given place in the grand review of
all the troops in the circuit. The
next day they gave a special drill be-
fore the emperor. The drill consist
ed of a little troop work in close or
der, of the Cossack exercise in the
saddle with the pony at full speed.
ana ended with all the boys standing
in their saddles, advancing in line and
singing their native songs.
1T is difficult to say who enjoyed (
the more. the few spectators or the
boys themselves. 1t made a very
pretty sight, yet behind the striking
picture was the touching side-those
little boys from that far-off province
in the presence of their ear, an cpl
sode never to be forgotten by them o.
their children's children. .
THE thought at once occurred -
me: why, if Russia can do this much
for its boys, cannot America at least
do as we'll for its sons?
Would it not be possible out Of the
vast annual expenditures to devote a
very few dollars as a.reward to some
small troopaof boy sceuts-to equip
them temporarily with the few things
needed by troop of boys, to give
them a trip to Washington and let
them see the President?
{ we have the ponies, we have the
country and we have the boys; there
iz nothing an average boy would Ike
better than to have a pony and be do
ine some really useful work with him.
The horse and all that pertains
thereto is fast being forgotten by the
people at large. Fs,it not worth While
to try and raise once again some boys,
such as their forefathers were, with
the love of the horse and the love of
riding instilled in them? While much
could not be accomplished al first, a
little start might be made even though
but here and there in the country.
Starting with the boys themselves
we build a rolling stone that will gath
er momentum by itself, and perhaps
once again We may see in America
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