On Travel and Other Things 23 
both friendship and protection if required. Nor is there a pleasanter 
means of forming acquaintance with Spanish country life and customs 
than a few evenings spent thus at a farm-house or village inn in any 
retired district of laughter-loving Andalucia. 
For rough living we are of course prepared, and accept the 
necessity without demur or second thought while travelling. But 
when more serious objects are in hand—say big-game or the 
study of nature, objects which demand more leisurely progress, 
or actually encamping for a week or more at selected points— 
then we prefer to assure complete independence of all local assist- 
ance and shelter. 
An expedition on this 
scale involves an amount of 
care and forethought that 
only those who have experi- 
enced it would credit. For 
in Spain it is an unknown 
undertaking, and to engineer 
something new is always 
dithcult. Quite an exten- 
sive camping-trip can be 
organised in Africa, where 
the system is understood, 
with less than a hundredth 
part of the care needed for Types of Spanis Bino-Lire 
a comparatively short trip SLY Menon ies Tearsudotasy 
in Spain where it is not. A true European canary, but its song is harsh 
The necessary bulk of camp- 
outfit and equipment requires a considerable cavalcade, and this 
mule-transport (since no provender is obtainable in the country) 
involves carrying along all the food for the animals—the heaviest 
item of all. Naturally the cost of such expeditions works out to 
nearly double that of simple riding. 
But, after all, it is worth it! Compare some of the miseries 
we have above but lightly touched upon—the dirt and squalor, 
the nameless horrors of choza or posada—with the sense of joyous 
exhilaration felt when encamped by the banks of some babbling 
trout-stream or in the glorious freedom of the open hill. Casting 
back in mental reverie over a lengthening vista of years, we 
certainly count as among the happiest days of life those spent 
and hissing. 
