Cinch him up
Be careful, however, to see that your aparejo is long enough for your beast, otherwise you will get him so chafed under the tail as to be unable to work. See, too, that your horses get a rough rub down before being saddled, and that your blankets are ample and well put on. Just as there are many kinds of pack-saddles, so are there many ways of tying on your packs; but one good way is sufficient, and that known as the diamond hitch has been adopted almost unanimously as the best by the men who live by packing. Here I might give directions for the tying of the diamond hitch, but the object of this book is to supply information useful to the hunter, and written instructions in the tying of the diamond hitch would not fall into that category. A man may learn to pack by practical experience and with pack, pony and an expert before him, but I do not believe anyone could learn from printed directions. Should anyone care to try, an excellent series of articles upon the subject, by a thoroughly practical man signing himself ‘Yo,’ may be found in ‘Forest and Stream’ for June 2, 1887, and following numbers. Let your camp man be a practical packer, would be my first advice to anyone meditating a shooting expedition in America. To anyone who had ever made such an expedition such advice would be unnecessary. There should be no difficulty in finding a man who can both pack and (in a rough way) cook. I was going to say that any fool could cook sufficiently well for a hunter’s camp, but the recollection of beans fried without boiling, a vivid memory of some of the abuses of baking powder, and a certain black-currant pudding boiled without basin or pudding-cloths, make me pause.
In addition to the aparejos, sweat-pads, and saddle-blankets before mentioned, all of which go under your packs, you must provide yourself with what are known as manteaux, i.e. squares of stout waterproofed canvas which are thrown over the packs to protect them not only from rain, but also from pointed boughs and such like which would otherwise tear the packs in passing through a timbered country. With these, cinches, sling ropes, halter ropes, and a good supply of spare rope of the kinds known respectively as half-and quarter-inch, the sportsman should be able to transport all he requires through almost any country.
As to the packs themselves, I would recommend that as far as possible everything should be put up in stout canvas bags and labelled. This plan saves infinite trouble in the long run. Some things of course must be carried in tins, and among these should be your matches, which will thus be protected from damp, and will have no chance of making dinner a horror, as the ordinary sulphur matches loose amongst provisions have a habit of doing. Even for matches a stout well-corked bottle is better than the best tin.
Packs are generally arranged as two side packs, and one top pack, and square side packs (in wooden boxes) with blankets, tents, and such like bundles for top pack seem most convenient. Round side packs are apt to shift.
Above all things see that your side packs are about equal in weight and hang about level. The contents of the packs must depend to a great extent upon the tastes and means of the hunter, but for simple men travelling in a difficult country the list of necessaries given below should suffice for two sportsmen, two gillies and a cook during an expedition of two months’ duration.
I have allowed a gillie or hunter to each sportsman, as well as a camp cook between them, although my own experience has been that your greatest happiness and best success begin when you have learned to hunt alone. That two make more noise than one; that your own eyes (not another’s) are the best eyes for you to use; and that a white man with practice is better than any red skin, are articles of faith which will be approved by experience.
However, of this more in another place. The accompanying list of stores, &c., has been based upon the lists of things used by the writer in former expeditions, in none of which (at any rate since 1883) has there been any running short of supplies.