Difficulties

It is possible that having read up to this point, a Scoutmaster may be thinking to himself "I quite agree that the Patrol System is the best way in which a Troop can be organized and conducted, and am fully aware that many of the best Troops in the country are run entirely upon these lines, but in view of the exceptional circumstances in which I am placed it is quite impracticable to adopt Patrol Training in my own Troop." One Scoutmaster puts forward the peculiarity of his boys-their exceptional fickleness or their surprising solidity-another speaks of their scattered homes and of long distances to be traversed on dark winter nights. One Scoutmaster finds that in his Troop there are peculiar difficulties with regard to the older boys, while another discovers that he is singularly situated with regard to the younger ones. One man cannot work his Troop in Patrols because he has got no Assistant Scoutmaster, and another finds it impossible because he has a wife and three children and has to work late at the office.
The point to remember, however, is that there is no Troop, either in town or in country, which will not be all the better for working. on the Chief Scout's lines. Let it be at once admitted that there is hardly a Scoutmaster in the Brotherhood who is not an exceptional man working with extraordinary boys under unusual conditions with peculiar difficulties! That is the whole charm of it. The Movement itself is peculiar - peculiarly inspiring - and to make it a success one requires peculiarly helpful and original methods of training and organization. Such methods are summed up under the heading - "The Patrol System."
Again, a Scoutmaster may say, "I believe in this system of training, but I have run my Troop on other lines for two or three years and it is not possible now to make a change. If I could start again it would be different." May it, therefore, be stated here beyond any impossibility of ambiguity or misunderstanding that the Patrol System is no cut-and-dried plan, but arises from a special attitude of mind - a belief that the character training and education of a boy should be evolved from within rather than imposed from without. The boys, in fact, must make themselves into Scouts - nobody else can do it for them. The shirt and shorts may be imposed from without, but it is only out of the heart and mind of the boy himself that the Scouting spirit can be successfully evolved. This attitude of mind does not take years to produce. It comes within a week by rereading "Scouting for Boys" from the boy's point of view.
The way to start the Patrol System is by having a preliminary talk with the boys about the idea of the Patrol as a self-contained unit, and then without any waste of time by establishing the Court of Honor and the Patrol Competition as two permanent Troop institutions. The other developments will come by themselves.