CHAPTER IX
FITTING UP THE CAMP FOR USE
Any girl who has crossed the ocean knows how impossible, the first time she entered her little white cabin, that bit of space looked as a place in which to sleep and to spend part of her time. There seemed to be no room in it for anything; it was difficult to turn around in, there were so few hooks on which to hang things, and the berth—dear me, that berth! So her thoughts ran. Yet gradually, as she learned the ropes, she was able to make it homelike. With experience she learned that the more bags she had in which to put things, the easier it was to keep this little stateroom in order. The next time she took with her every conceivable sort of bag for every conceivable sort of object. Also she had learned that the more she could do without unnecessary things in her cabin and steamer trunk, the more comfort was hers to enjoy. By the time she had crossed the ocean often, she had learned the art of having little but all that she needed with her—the art of making herself comfortable in a stateroom.
Even so is there an art in learning how to camp, a happy art of which there is always something left to learn. The oldest campers never get beyond the point where they can make a slight improvement in their kit or their methods. In the end you will work out your own salvation for the kind of camping you wish to do. It is my intention to point out to you only what might be called the ground plan of fitting up a camp for use. Those little individual adaptations which every one of us makes, increasing familiarity with camp life will help you to make for yourselves.
First, last, and always, when making out your camp lists, revise them carefully with the idea of cutting out everything unnecessary. All besides what you actually need will be clutter. The best way to do is to make out your lists, putting down everything that comes to you. Then go over them by yourselves and a second time with some one else. Your check lists for camp are important and should always be conscientiously made out, with nothing left to chance, nothing done hit or miss.
If you are to furnish a camp, remember that your packing boxes can do great work in helping to set you up in your new home. In rough camping such boxes do well for dressers, washstands and, with a little carpentry, also for clothes presses. A piece of enameled cloth on the top of the one to be used as a washstand, and a towel or white curtain strung on a string in front of it, behind which you can put dirty clothes, make a thoroughly satisfactory article of furniture. In camp there is no need to think about elegance. Fitness and usefulness are all the girl need ever consider. It is astonishing how much beauty your homely cabin and white tent will acquire—a beauty all their own.
For tent camping the usual camp cot bed is probably most satisfactory, for it is light and readily carried. If you are on the march and carrying at the most a tent fly for protection, you will, of course, sleep on bough beds or browse beds. Small, cut saplings, well trimmed, make good springs for beds. Any guide can help you to make the beds, and you would better be about it early, for it takes a good three-quarters of an hour to make a comfortable bough bed. Perhaps a few suggestions will not come amiss. You will, of course, have both good hunting knives, worn in a leather sheath on a leather belt, and belt-sheath hatchets. With the hatchet cut down a stout little balsam tree. From this break the tips from the big branches, having them about one foot in length. These foot-length stems make good bed springs and are the only bed springs you will have on a balsam couch unless you provide the spring yourself because of some green worm who is industriously measuring off the length of your nose, no doubt in amazement that there should be anything so extraordinarily long in the world. However, he is a harmless little chap, and the balsam tree having treated him very kindly, he will be greatly surprised at any other kind of entertainment which he may receive from you. Now, having got your “feathers,” select a smooth piece of ground with a slight slope toward the foot. Press the stems of the feathers into the earth, laying them tier after tier as you have seen a roof shingled, until your bed is wide enough, long enough, and soft enough to give you a good and sweet-scented night of sleep upon it. Lay a fair-sized log along each side and across the foot. This balsam bough bed can be made up as often as you wish with fresh feathers. Place one blanket on top and it is ready for your use. If you have got pitch on your hands in doing this, rub them with a little butter or lard and it will come off.
DR. CARRINGTON’S SLEEPING BAG.