Scouting for Boys

by Baron Robert Stephenson Smyth Baden-Powell Baden-Powell of Gilwell

A great cause of illness nowadays is the amount of medicine which fellows dose themselves with when there is no reason for taking any medicine at all. The best medicine is open-air and exercise and a big cup of water in the early morning if you are constipated, and a pint of hot water on going to bed.

CLOTHING.

A scout's clothing should be of flannel or wool as much as possible, because it dries easily. Cotton next the skin is not good unless you change it directly it gets wet—it is so likely to give you a chill, and a scout is no use if he gets laid up.

One great point that a scout should take care about, to ensure his endurance and being able to go on the march for a long time, is his boots.

A scout who gets sore feet with much walking becomes useless.

You should therefore take great care to have good, well-fitting, roomy boots, and fairly stout ones, and as like the natural shape of your bare feet as possible with a straighter edge on the inside than bootmakers usually give to the swagger boot. Scouts have no use for swagger boots.

The feet should be kept as dry as possible; if they are allowed to get wet the skin is softened and very soon gets blistered and rubbed raw where there is a little pressure of the boot.

Of course they get wet from perspiration as well as from outside wet. Therefore to dry this it is necessary to wear good woollen socks.

If a man wears thin cotton or silk socks you can tell at once that he is no walker. A fellow who goes out to a Colony for the first time is called a "Tender-foot" because he generally gets sore feet until by experience he learns how to keep his feet in good order. It is a good thing to soap or grease your feet and the inside of your socks before putting them on.

If your feet always perspire a good deal it is a useful thing to powder them with powder made of boric acid, starch, and oxide of zinc in equal parts. This powder should be rubbed in between the toes so as to prevent soft corns forming there. Your feet can be hardened to some extent by soaking them in alum and water, or salt and water.