FORT A.P. HILL, Va. -- The sour scent of sweat pierced the night air. The forest floor was barely visible under beach towels covered with Scout patches displayed for trading. A tiny youngster in a baseball cap skipped frenetically through the crowd, his high-pitched scream rising over a cacophony of haggling.
"Anyone want this?" he yelled, holding a patch aloft. He stopped, jabbing his fingers at the patch. "Look! It's silk! SILK!"
Nearby, Tim Baldwin, 16, of West Chester, Pa., tried to pawn off a piece of "bait" -- a truly lame Cub Scout patch covered with rainbows and bears and the words "Day Camp." He fibbed, earnestly telling the trader that it was unique, and scored a patch showing a cartoonish bee. But it was a Boy Scout patch -- a slight step up.
This is the heated world of patch trading at the National Scout Jamboree, one so addictive that some Scouts practically abandon canoeing and mountain biking to concentrate on frenzied quests for patches that glow in the dark, change color when warmed by the sun or feature the video game Halo.
Today, the last day of the quadrennial campout, many of the 32,000 Scouts here will depart with bags full of patches -- the kind meant to be keepsakes, not earned. Most Scouts will have traded fairly, but some will have deceived, stolen and even paid -- a strictly forbidden practice -- for their treasures. Once home, the fever worn off, most will store them until the next Jamboree.
"It's gone overboard," said Tony DiSalvo, 76, a Distinguished Eagle Scout from Williamsport, Pa., who has attended every jamboree since the first one, in 1937. "But they enjoy it, so what are you going to do?"
For 10 days, business has been brisk. Scouts have lined roads all day, their wares displayed in neat rows. Come nightfall, they toted their collections and lanterns out to wild patch bazaars, where they sealed deals with handshakes and called one another "Sir."
"There's no friendly words," said Chuck Schappert, 16, one of Baldwin's troop mates. "It's strictly business."
In the old days, Scouts traded to learn about each other. Iowa troops, for example, would swap patches and homegrown potatoes for a California troop's patch and a chunk of redwood.
Fellowship remains; some Scouts collect patches from each state, and brief chats ensue over most trades. But the targets for the most rabid collectors are "top tier" patches, official 2005 jamboree badges craved for their rarity -- some councils order fewer patches -- or design.
During this jamboree, those included the Connecticut Rivers Council's patches, which are adorned with the green lizard of SoBe beverages, and the Bay Area (Tex.) Council's Halo patch -- for which, rumor has it, one Scout traded his iPod.
"People will trade anything for a Halo patch," said Erik Chumbley, 15, of Colorado Springs.
