CAMP LIFE. 289 
CHAPTEK XXIX. 
CAMP LIFE. 
One of tlie most important matters that demand the 
sportsman's attention, is the equipment he should take 
with him to make his life in the woods pleasant. He will 
have many annoyances and even hardships to encounter, 
and should be as well prepared to meet them as circum- 
stances will permit. The following directions are founded 
upon the idea he intends to retire to the wilderness, far 
from the abode of man, where he will have to trust for 
his support to his own exertions, and although many of 
them may seem superfluous, and to the robust may savor 
of effeminacy, to those who desire real comfort they will 
prove acceptable. 
The great pest of the wild woods is — not tigers nor 
panthers, not bears nor wolves, not even snakes — but 
something far smaller but infinitely more terrible — the 
Black Fly ! If it were possible for the uninitiated to 
conceive or the pen to describe the horrors conveyed in 
these words, I should endeavor to record them. Think 
of the rack, the boot, the thumb-screw, the wheel ; think 
of being rent asunder by wild horses, or torn in bits with 
hot pincers ; think of the tortures of the inquisition, or 
the cruel fanaticism of India, and smile ; they do not 
compare with the black fly. When mosquitoes hover 
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