210 EDGE OF THE JUNGLE 
seen an Indian sink his hamaca posts into sand 
with one swift, concentrated motion, mathemati- 
cal in its precision and surety, so that he might 
enter at once into a peaceful night of tranquil 
and unbroken slumber, while I, a tenderfoot then, 
must needs beat my stakes down into the ground 
with tremendous energy, only to come to earth 
with a resounding thwack the moment I mounted 
my couch. 
The Red Man made his comment, smiling: 
“Yellow earth, much squeeze.” Which, being 
translated, informed me that the clayey ground 
I had chosen, hard though it seemed, was more 
like putty in that it would slip and slip with the 
prolonged pressure until the post fell inward and 
catastrophe crowned my endeavor. 
So it follows that the hammock, in company 
with an adequate tarpaulin and two trustworthy 
stakes, will survive the heaviest downpour as well 
as the most arid and uncompromising desert. 
But since it is man-made, with finite limitations, 
nature is not without means to defeat its purpose. 
The hammock cannot cope with the cold—real 
cold, that is, not the sudden chill of tropical night 
which a blanket resists, but the cold of the north 
or of high altitudes. This is the realm of the 
