Sleeping Bags.
In one of the books Dutchy came across the description of a sleeping bag. It was made of reindeer’s skin sewed into a large bag with the fur side turned in. This bag was large enough to hold three or four sleepers, and each man was covered with a pair of woolen bags, one bag slipped inside the other. The woolen bags were made of blankets sewed together and provided with flaps at the upper ends to cover the head of the sleeper.
Of course, we had to make a sleeping bag, too. The innermost bag was made of an old quilt and the next one of a blanket that we were fortunate enough to get hold of. But when it came to the reindeer skin we were balked, until we happened to run across a piece of rubber sheeting at the village store. This was a lucky find, for I doubt if one country store in a hundred carries such stock. The piece was just large enough to cover the blanket bag and allow for an ample flap to cover the head. To be sure, this furnished a shelter for only one person, and there were six in the society. It was clear that the treasury could not afford the expense of six sleeping bags; but as such a device would be useful only under very unusual circumstances we decided that two sleeping bags would be all the society would need. We had been rather curious to explore the country back of the hills on the Pennsylvania side of the river, and with some light provisions and these sleeping bags strapped to the back a couple of boys could make quite an extended tour, unmindful of weather conditions. On real hot nights a fellow could get into the quilt bag and sleep on the blanket and waterproof bag. In cold weather the combination of all three bags provided sufficient warmth. The rubber bag would protect the sleeper from any moisture in the ground, and would also keep him thoroughly dry, even in a pouring rain.
Bill’s “Mummy Case.”
Our second sleeping bag was Bill’s own design, and was, in many respects, an improvement on the first, though it looked ridiculously like an Egyptian mummy case. The inner bags
Fig. 200. Bottom Piece of Sleeping Bag. were just like those of the first sleeping bag, but as there was no more rubber sheeting in town we had to make the outer bag of enameled cloth, such as is used for carriage curtains. Out of this cloth Bill cut a piece of the shape shown in Fig. 200 to serve as bottom, sides and ends of the sleeping bag. The bag was sewed wrong side out; that is, the piece was laid with enameled side up, and then the corners were sewed together after painting the seams with white lead. Then a
Fig. 201. Top Piece of Sleeping Bag. top piece was cut out, of the size indicated in Fig. 201. The edges were hemmed over a piece of rope, which thus formed a corded edge. Now, with the enameled side of the cover piece turned inward, its edges were sewed to the edges of the first piece. The bag was now turned inside out, so that the enameled surface lay on the outside and the seams turned inward.
