FOREWORD. — THIS book — Sea Scouting for Boys — was written by my brother Warington. It was under his guidance that I, when a youngster, began my Scouting as a Sea Scout. He was himself both a sailor and a boy at heart and so his teaching told. I have never forgotten those breezy times and the things that I learned under him have had their lifelong value for me. Since the first edition of this book its author has passed to Higher Service, but to the end he remained as he had lived — a sailor and a boy. It was, largely thanks to his interest in boys and in seamanship that Sea Scouting became popular in the early days of our movement, so that when the Great War came suddenly upon the nation the Sea Scouts proved able at once to take over the duties of the Coastguards when these were called away to man the fleet. Thus the Scouts watched our Coasts from John O‘Groats to the Land‘s End during the whole period of the War. Also they provided a considerable contingent of signallers, cooks and bridge boys to man the auxiliary fleet. They so acquitted themselves that at the end of the war they received the public thanks of the Admiralty and of His Majesty the King himself. — This book by helping more boys in their turn to become handymen for their country will stand as a fitting memorial to the life and character of its author. R. B.-P. PREFACE ―ENGLAND expects that every man will do his duty.‖ So signalled Admiral Lord Nelson on October 21, 1805, on going into action off Cape Trafalgar. The reason of this book is to help boys to be prepared to do their duty. The safety of the whole British Empire depends—Mother Country, Overseas State and Colony—on every man being more or less a sailor. ―More,‖ that he may be prepared if called upon to do his duty afloat; ―less,‖ that he may have sufficient knowledge of the sea and ships as a landsman to do his duty in preventing his country from relinquishing the command of the sea. The boy who imbibes the elements of Seamanship and the sailor-touch by making the water, sea, river, or lake, his playground will grow into the man prepared to do his duty to his country, whether in Old England or her Colonies. I have difficulty in writing on such wide and technical subjects as pertain to the sea and ships, in a manner of sufficiently elementary treatment and condensed form as is necessary for young boys and a small book. What the older boys ―don‘t like they can lump,‖ and what any boy does not understand he can ask of his Scoutmaster, and what the Scoutmaster wants better explanation or further information upon he can find detailed, in the Admiralty Manual of Seamanship or Tait’s New Seamanship. This book is intended to be merely a chat with boys upon aquatic matters. It is not intended as a work of instruction for the sea profession, nor for the education of shore going men into Sea Scout matters. I have had many kindly meant suggestions made to me to add new and deeper matter; in short, advanced seamanship and navigation. I would do it, but that I consider it would go beyond the useful limit for boys. Warington Baden-Powell TO PARENTS AND GUARDIANS The boy scout movement is, as the merchants say, ―a going concern,‖ and sea scouting is merely a branch of the same organisation taking up nautical matters in further development of boy scout training, and it does not necessarily mean the boys taking to the sea as a profession afterwards. Sea scout training, by bringing the boys into intelligent contact with all pertaining to the sea in the attractive manner common to scouting, will give the boy some of the handiness, resourcefulness, pluck, and discipline of the seaman. The handiness which the boy picks up in this way is a form of character education which is certain to be of great value to him in after life, whatever profession he may take up. The sea scout training will interest the boy and attract him to the study of seamanship, watermanship, and coastguard work. The free open air life of sea coast scouting, boating, and camping, added to his previous shore scout training, will furnish all the manly and charactermaking qualities that a parent could wish a son to develop. Sea scout training differs from what is known as training ship education; there the boy is intended for the sea profession, all else gives place to a life of drills and routine, a day and night, month and year, training with one object only in view, the sea. Should the boy find at the end of his ship schooling, as many do, that the sea life has become distasteful, too difficult, or, perhaps, uncertain, he may also find himself then unfitted for taking up any other line of employment. With the sea scout, on the other hand, the training is merely his pastime and outing; he learns the sailor‘s touch and sea-going ways, he learns it as a game or sport, instead of having it drilled into him with irksome and often unintelligible, routine of the ―Training Ship.‖ The sea profession is, with our growing fleets both of Royal Navy and Mercantile Marine, being now more carefully nurtured, and the career of the sea will undoubtedly improve in condition and in the security of service the two cardinal faults of two-thirds of the Mercantile Marine service for many years past. The steadily growing demand, even in peace, for men and boys to man the Fleet is pointing out the absolute necessity of a large reserve in the Mercantile Marine to possibly draw from, and unless the conditions of living and security of employment in the Mercantile Marine are sufficiently attractive the quality of, the personnel of that service will not be up to the requirements of Naval reserve. In our oversea Dominions the ―call of the sea‖ is of even greater moment at the present time than it is in the Mother Country, for the Dominions have new navies being built, and the personnel wherewith to man the ships as they come afloat has, to a large extent, yet to be organised and trained, and a reserve formed. There is no need to sound the ―call of the sea‖ in the ear of the boy scout, his training as a sea scout will put him in touch with the sea and ships, and gradually show him what the sea life is, and that he is soundly qualifying towards a very high foundation of sailor construction, while in no way relinquishing or unfitting himself for other branches or professions of life on shore. The work of sea scouting will grow with the boy, beyond mere individual knowledge and outing pastime, into collective duties for the public good. The work of coast guarding, life saving, salvage, and so on will be undertaken by boat‘s crews and companies trained and equipped for the work under the boy scout organization. TO BOY SCOUTS. Such a lot of Scouts want to become Sea Scouts that it has become necessary to write a book specially designed to help them. Of course you know all that there is in the book Scouting for Boys. Well all that lot goes with this, for all the rules and laws of Scouting apply to Sea Scouts. Then there are titles, qualifications, badges, and duties which have nothing to do with Shore Scouts, but everything to do with Sea Scouting. Of course sailors know something about the sea and ships, but Scouts ought to know all about everything, not only what is going on to-day, but of the old times, the ways and deeds of early voyages, such as of Drake and Raleigh, the ships of Elizabeth‘s time, Nelson‘s time, and then our time. There are the stories of pirates, slavers, and privateer, very often drawn a long way off the truth, usually so as to fit the needs of the story of the book; here you will only read the true character of such men, no matter how they appear as heroes in fiction. Though they were Sea Scouts of the finest quality in fighting, or escaping, the pirates never held a single other quality that you know all good Scouts should hold. Take the ten points of Scout Law in your book, the pirate‘s acts were the exact opposite. He had no such thing as honour. He had no king or country to be loyal to. He never was useful to others nor helped anyone; he only helped himself out of others. He was the enemy of all, not the friend. However you can read about him later on. To some extent you may be puzzled by nautical words, but you will soon get to know them, and then you will see that if shore-going words had been written instead of sailors‘ language you never would learn the language of the sea, and the book would have to be chock-full of explanations; so I shall stick as far as possible to ―Jack‘s‖ simple lingo, and if you get hung up over a phrase it will be easy and useful to get it explained by your Scoutmaster. This little book is not a complete work on seamanship and navigation, nor a history of the world, but, just as far as I can imagine your wants, a collection of the main points a Sea Scout ought to know.