Part 25 (1/2)

WHAT HE SHOULD TAKE

Before going to Africa I read as et hold of on the subject, soiven a chapter detailing the necessary outfit Invariably they have followed the Englishman's ideas almost absolutely nobody has ventured to modify those ideas in any essential ly ventured to remark that it is as well to leave out the tinned carfare-if you do not like carfare; but that is as far as they care to go The lists are those of the fir caravans

The heads of such firenerally old African travellers They furnish the equipenerally all de a printed list of essentials for shooting parties in Africa, including carfare

Travellers follow the lists blindly, and later copy theht to eht of reason, and to pick out what a lish habits, would like to have This cannot be done a priori; it requires the test of experience to determine how to meet, in our oay, the unusual demands of climate and conditions

And please note, when the heads of these equipment firms, these old African travellers, take the field for themselves, they pay no attention whatever to their own printed lists of ”essentials”

Now, prelish sportsman has, by many years'

experience, worked out just what he likes to take into the field; and assuring you solemnly that his ideas are not in the least the ideas of A for ourselves

At present the Alish idea, which is not adapted to hio it blind, without experience except that acquired in a te to copy out the English list again, even for coh, you can find it in any book on modern African travel Of course I realize well that few Ao to Africa; but I also realize well that the sportser enthusiast over ite emphatically of him-would avidly devour the details of the proper outfit for the gentle art of hunting the totally extinct whiffenpoof

Let us begin, first of all, with:

Personal Equipment Clothes On the top of your head you must have a sun helmet Get it of cork, not of pith The latter has a habit ofunobtrusively about your ears when it rains A hel to a circus band, so it is alell to have, also, a double terai This is not so to eat It is a wide felt hat, and then another wide felt hat on top of that The vertical-rays-of-the-tropical-sun (pronounced as one word to save time after you have heard and said it a thousand tiled and lost soood contraption to go in all day when the sun is strong

As underwear you want the lightest Jaeger wool Doesn't sound well for tropics, but it is an essential You will sweat enough anyway, even if you get down to a brass wire costume like the natives It is when you stop in the shade, or the breeze, or the dusk of evening, that the trouble comes A chill means trouble, SURE Two extra suits are all you want There is no earthly sense in bringing more Your tent boy washes them out whenever he can lay hands on them-it is one of his harmless manias

Your shi+rt should be of the thinnest brown flannel Leather the shoulders, and part way down the upper arainst the thorns when you dive through them On the back you have buttons seith to attach a spine pad Before I went to Africa I searched eagerly for inforuessed what it must be for, and to an extent what it must be like, but all writersitself Here is the first authorized description A spine pad is a quilted affair in consistency like the things you are supposed to lift hot flat-irons with On the outside it is brown flannel, like the shi+rt; on the inside it is a gaudy orange colour The latter is not for aesthetic effect, but to intercept actinic rays It is eight or ten inches wide, is shaped to button close up under your collar, and extends halfway down your back In addition it is well to wear a silk handkerchief around the neck; as the spine and back of the head seem to be the most vulnerable to the sun

For breeches, suit yourself as to h, and of fast colour The best cut is the ”se,” loose at the knees, which should be well faced with soft leather, both for crawling, and to save the cloth in grass and low brush One pair ought to last fourYou will find a thin pair of ordinary khaki trousers very co I would call your attention to ”shorts” Shorts are loose, bobbed off khaki breeches, like knee drawers With thes, and low boots The knees are bare They are lishmen I observed them carefully at every opportunity, and ed to invent as idiotically unfitted a contraption for the purpose in hand