Now, what you
need is _formation_--see? Must have some sort of formation
for advance. Must keep in touch. For two men a tandem is right. For
three men, what you want is a spike-team--middle man crawls ahead,
other men follow on each side just near enough to touch his left
heel with right hand and right heel with left hand--a triangle,
see? Keep touching once every thirty seconds. If you miss it,
leader crawls back, side men crawl in, sure to meet, nobody gets
lost. Go as far _as_ you can, then spread out like a fan, fold
together _when_ you can, come back _if_ you can--that's
the way to cover the most possible ground on a listening post. Do
you get me?"
"We get you," they nodded. "It's a wonderful scheme." And Rosenlaube
added in his most impressive literary manner: "Plato, it _must_
be so, thou reasonest well."
"But tell me," said the lieutenant, "what were you fellows chattering
about so loud when I came down?"
So they told him, and, according to the habit of college boys,
they skirmished over the ground of debate again, and Barker Bunn
vigorously supported the majority opinion, and Mitchell was left
in a hopeless minority of one, clinging obstinately to his faith
that there had been, and still might be, some use for the German
language.
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