For distances over these, think out for yourself which point is halfway to the object. Estimate how far this may be from you, and then double it to obtain the distance. Or another way is to estimate the furthest distance that the object can be away, and then the very nearest it could be, and strike a mean between the two.
Objects appear nearer than they really are: First, when the light is bright and shining on the object; secondly, when looking across water or snow, or looking uphill or down. Objects appear further off when in the shade; across a valley; when the background is of the same colour; when the observer is lying down or kneeling; when there is a heat haze over the ground.
FINDING THE NORTH.
Every sailor boy knows the points of the compass by heart and so should a scout. I have talked a good deal about the north, and you will understand that it is a most important help to a scout in pathfinding to know the direction of the north.
If you have not a compass the sun will tell you by day where the north is, and the moon and the stars by night.
At six o'clock in the morning the sun is due east, at nine o'clock he is south-east, at noon he is south, at three o'clock in the afternoon he is south-west, and at six o'clock he is due west. In winter he will have set long before six o'clock, but he will not have reached due west when he is set.
The Phoenicians who sailed round Africa in ancient times noticed that when they started the sun rose on their left-hand side—they were going south. Then they reported that they got to a strange country where the sun got up in the wrong quarter, namely, on their right-hand. The truth was that they had gone round the Cape of Good Hope and were steering north again up the east side of Africa.
Directions.
To find the south at any time of day by the sun—hold your watch flat, face upwards, so that the sun shines on it. Turn it round till the hour hand points at the sun. Then, without moving the watch, lay the edge of a piece of paper or a pencil across the face of the watch so that it rests on the centre of the dial and points out halfway between the Figure XII. and the hour hand. The line given by that pencil will be the true south and north line.