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AL TAS 224 ea) “ 

THE ART OF CAMPING 5s 
Iam not a total abstainer—neither am Ia 
drunkard. My inclination is to take a little 
good liquor into camp. In the tropics I 
believe a little spirits necessary to health, 
though many will not agree with me. The 
reports of the American army surgeons in 
the Philippines show clearly that the great- 
est sufferers from the climate are the total 
akstainers. The same results have been 
found to obtain in India and in the other 
numerous tropical portions of the British 
Empire. Yet, though I should like always 
to have a bottle of sound whisky at com- 
mand, I have given up taking such a thing 
to the woods. I found the plan did not 
work. Nine out of ten guides and Indians 
will get drunk whenever the opportunity 
presents itself. These men are perfectly 
wretched while there is a drop of liquor in 
camp. Hide it as you will, they have an 
instinct that is unerring, and its discovery 
is certain within twenty-four hours of leav- 
ing civilization. ‘Then they will plot and 
plan to get at it, and, failing this, will feign 
all kinds of terrible ailments in the hope of 
working upon your sympathies. By and by 
bottles and men will come into close prox- 
imity, and then you will have a very disa- 
greeable twenty-four hours ahead of you. I 
have had men, and good ones, too, when 
they were sober, break open boxes, slit 
waterproof bags with their hunting knives, 
lose boxes overboard in the rapids in order 
to fish for them after dark on the quiet, and 
all because they scented whisky. Now, my 
only exhilaration is derived from a cup of the 
best black tea. 
After a time, unless one shirks a fair 
share of the work, the body gets into such 
admirable condition that all the cravings 
and promptings caused by an unnatural life 
disappear, and I am quite sure that the man 
who swings a paddle or an axe whenever 
opportunity offers, and carries a fair load 
over the portages, will soon get into such 
condition that he will not miss the delicacies 
he has left behind. 
A great many people who go into the 
woods think it necessary to lug about a 
sheet-iron stove—in fact, some of the more 
_luxurious have been seen toting full-sized 
kitchen ranges over the Northern water- 
ways. Yet, in a wooded country a stove is 
by no means a desirable addition to the 
outfit. Two green logs parallel to each 
other and not more than six inches apart 
serve as an admirable cooking range. A 
fire of hardwood is built between them, 
and after a little time there is a bed of hot 
coals that will keep a dozen pots and kettles 
singing merrily. This is a better fire for 
cooking on than the standard pattern camp- 
fire, which is too large and fierce for the 
cook to stand over. When, however, you 
have nothing but the camp-fire, and yet wish 
to ‘‘boil the kettle,” rake a few of the hot 
ashes out to one side and cook over them. 
In some parts of the Northwest, when a 
cook was preparing a meal for a large gang, 
we used to dig a trench about a foot wide 
and ten or twelve feet long. This trench 
was filled with hot coals and the pots hung 
above it, by hooking them over a long pole 
resting in forked uprights at either end of 
the trench. This is a capital plan in an 
unsheltered locality where the wind blows 
fiercely and fuel must be economized. Ours 
on these occasions was generally dead wil- 
low boughs, and though they make a very 
hot fire, it is one that burns quickly. In the 
dead bush the two green boughs already 
mentioned serve an equally useful purpose. 
The tendency of inexperienced men is to 
take a quantity of luxuries into the woods. 
By so doing, unless they have plenty of 
strong, sustaining food as well, they simply 
invite starvation. I have supplied men of 
another party with food, in answer to their 
urgent request, although they had any 
amount of delicacies yet untouched. When 
a man is paddling hour after hour and day 
after day, in the hot summer sun, he loses 
weight and strength very fast unless his 
food is of such a nature that it gives him the 
necessary vigor. Lumbermen have dis- 
covered that for hard work, pork, beans, 
beef and bread must be their main reliance. 
Occasionally, a well-meaning ‘“‘boss”’ has 
fed his men upon made-up dishes, such as 
stews, ragouts, beef croquettes, etc., but 
such experiments did not last long, an angry 
chorus soon insisting upon a return to sim- 
ple, sustaining food. 
The soft, useless flesh of civilization must 
melt away under the strain of active exer- 
cise, but it should be replaced by hard 
muscle. If one’s weight diminishes very 
rapidly, it is a pretty sure sign that either the 
