When Pee-wee Harris returned from Temple Camp in the fall, he found himself a scout without a patrol. He had indulged in a colossal speculation and lost out. Forsaking the Raving Ravens, he had set forth to mobilize all the small, unattached boys at camp into the Pollywog Patrol, but the Pollywog Patrol had proved about as substantial as the shifting sand. Like the beloved Black Lake it had both an inlet and an outlet. As fast as one boy entered it another had to go home, so that conducting the Pollywog Patrol was like pouring water into a leaky pail. Pee-wee, with all his flaunted efficiency, could not be at both ends of this patrol at the same time. As soon as some miniature scout from New York had been duly initiated, some previously initiated scout from Chicago found that his time was up, and Pee-wee's time was chiefly occupied in rushing frantically about trying to keep pace with this epidemic of resignations.