"Did you?" said the Forecaster, interested. "That's nice of him! He wrote to me that he was constantly improving his kite models and that he had a couple of old ones which he now seldom flew. He sent me their records, too, so I know they must be good kites. He wanted to know if the Mississippi League of the Weather wouldn't do some kite-flying and send him records of the observations." "Would we?" cried the enthusiastic Monroe. "I should say we would!" "It means quite a bit of trouble," the weather expert warned them; "scientific kite-flying needs machinery." "Why, sir?" asked Ross. "Can't we do it by hand?" "No," was the reply, "you can't. How would you reel the kite home? It's a very different thing sending up a Japanese paper kite on a string a few hundred feet in the air, and making an ascent of a couple of miles with a weather kite. For one thing, the weather kite is flown with wire and an especially strong kind of wire at that." "Where will we get the wire?" "I've advanced the money for it," the Forecaster answered, "and for the shipment of the kites. I thought, perhaps, after a while, we might hold a kite contest and charge an admission fee, because, as you know, I think the League should be on a self-supporting basis. I'll render you a bill, then, and you can pay me." "Thanks ever so much, sir," said Ross. "That's fine. We'll do it. But who's to have charge of the kite-flying?" "That's your affair," the Forecaster answered. "I've nothing to do with the inner workings of the League." "I've been wondering," said Anton, "if Tom oughtn't to do it. He's our wind expert." Tom flushed with pleasure at the suggestion. "I haven't done much on the wind stuff," he admitted; "there didn't seem anything to do but to take measurements and things." "I seem to remember reading them weekly in the _Review_," the Forecaster remarked. "Oh, I've done it all regularly enough, but it didn't seem to be of much use," the boy said. "You'll find that it will be of a great deal of use in the League's kite work," the weather expert rejoined. "I think Anton's right," put in Ross. "Hands up those who think Tom ought to do it." Every hand shot up in the air. Tom shuffled his feet on the ground and squirmed uneasily. "All right," he said, "I'll try. You'll tell us what to do, Mr. Levin." The next few weeks were busy ones for the Mississippi League of the Weather. The building of the kite reel, more than anything else, gave the boys a sense of the power of the new force that they were going to handle. The _Weather Review_ announced the expected arrival of the two kites, and the interest of the neighborhood was aroused.