Cunners and lobsters are sometimes caught off bold rocks in a net. You can make one easily out of a hogshead-hoop, and twine stretched across so as to make a three-inch mesh.[25] Tie a lot of bait securely in the middle, sink it for a few minutes, and draw up rapidly. The rush of water through the net prevents the fish from escaping.
EXPENSES.
The expenses of camping or walking vary greatly, of course, according to the route, manner of going, and other things. The principal items are railroad-tickets, horse and wagon hire, trucking, land-rent (if you camp where rent is charged), and the cost of the outfit. You ought to be able to reckon very nearly what you will have to pay on account of these before you spend a cent. After this will come the calculation whether to travel at all by rail, supposing you wish to go a hundred miles to reach the seaside where you propose to camp, or the mountains you want to climb. If you have a horse and wagon, or are going horseback, it will doubtless be cheaper to march than to ride and pay freight. If time is plenty and money is scarce, you may perhaps be able to walk the distance cheaper than to go by rail; but, if you lodge at hotels, you will find it considerably more expensive. The question then is apt to turn on whether the hundred miles is worth seeing, and whether it is so thickly settled as to prevent your camping.
To walk a hundred miles, carrying your kit all the way, will take from one to two weeks, according to your age, strength, and the weather. We have already stated that there is little pleasure in walking more than sixty miles a week. But if you wish to go as fast as you can, and have taken pains to practise walking before starting, and can buy your food in small quantities daily, and can otherwise reduce your baggage, you can make the hundred miles in a week without difficulty, and more if it is necessary, unless there is much bad weather.
The expense for food will also vary according to one's will; but it need not be heavy if you can content yourself with simple fare. You can hardly live at a cheaper rate than the following:—
ONE WEEK'S SUPPLY FOR TWO MEN.
Ten pounds of pilot-bread; eight pounds of salt pork; one pound of coffee (roasted and ground); one to two pounds of sugar (granulated); thirty pounds of potatoes (half a bushel).[26] A little beef and butter, and a few ginger-snaps, will be good investments.
Supposing you and I were to start from home in the morning after breakfast; when noon comes, we eat the lunch we have taken with us, and press on. As the end of the day's march approaches, we look out to buy two quarts of potatoes at a farmhouse or store; and we boil or fry, or boil and mash in milk, enough of these for our supper. The breakfast next morning is much the same. We cook potatoes in every way we know, and eat the whole of our stock remaining, thus saving so much weight to carry. We also soak some pilot-bread, and fry that for a dessert, eating a little sugar on it if we can spare it. When dinner-time approaches, we keep a lookout for a chance to buy ten or twelve cents' worth of bread or biscuits. These are more palatable than the pilot-bread or crackers in our haversack. If we have a potato left from breakfast, we cook and eat it now. We cut off a slice of the corned beef, and take a nibble at the ginger-snaps. If we think we can afford three or four cents more, we buy a pint of milk, and make a little dip-toast. And so we go; sometimes we catch a fish, or pass an orchard whose owner gives us all the windfalls we want. We pick berries too; and keep a sharp lookout that we supply ourselves in season when our pilot-bread, sugar, pork, and butter run low. Some days we overtake farmers driving ox-carts or wagons; we throw our kits aboard, and walk slowly along, willing to lose a little time to save our aching shoulders. And in due time, if no accident befalls, nor rainy weather detains us, we arrive at our seashore or mountain.
You may like to know that this is almost an exact history, at least as far as eating is concerned, of a twelve days' tramp I once went on in company with two other boys. There was about five dollars in the party, and nearly two dollars of this was spent in paying toll on a boat that we took through a canal a part of the way. We carried coffee, sugar, pork, and beef from home, and ate potatoes three times a day. We had a delightful time, and came home fattened up somewhat; but I will admit that I did not call for potatoes when I got back to my father's table, for some days.
In general, however, it will be noticed that those who camp out for the season, or go on walking-tours, do so at a moderate expense because they start with the determination to make it cheap. For this purpose they content themselves with old clothes, which they fit over or repair, take cooking-utensils from their own kitchen, and, excepting in the matter of canned foods, do not live very differently from what they do at home.