登陆注册
5255500000105

第105章 APPENDIX V(3)

One can sleep in or on it, and it is a most effective garment against heavy winds. One suit of pajamas is enough, considering your tent boy's commendable mania for laundry work. Add handkerchiefs and you are fixed.

You will wear most of the above, and put what remains in your "officer's box." This is a thin steel, air-tight affair with a wooden bottom, and is the ticket for African work.

Sporting. Pick out your guns to suit yourself. You want a light one and a heavy one.

When I came to send out my ammunition, I was forced again to take the other fellow's experience. I was told by everybody that Ishould bring plenty, that it was better to have too much than too little, etc. I rather thought so myself, and accordingly shipped a trifle over 1,500 rounds of small bore cartridges.

Unfortunately, I never got into the field with any of my numerous advisers on this point, so cannot state their methods from first-hand information. Inductive reasoning leads me to believe that they consider it unsportsmanlike to shoot at a standing animal at all, or at one running nearer than 250 yards.

Furthermore, it is etiquette to continue firing until the last cloud of dust has died down on the distant horizon. Only thus can I conceive of getting rid of that amount of ammunition. In eight months of steady shooting, for example-shooting for trophies, as well as to feed a safari of fluctuating numbers, counting jackals, marabout and such small trash-I got away with 395 rounds of small bore ammunition and about 100 of large. This accounted for 225 kills. That should give one an idea. Figure out how many animals you are likely to want for ANY purpose, multiply by three, and bring that many cartridges.

To carry these cartridges I should adopt the English system of a stout leather belt on which you slip various sized pockets and loops to suit the occasion. Each unit has loops for ten cartridges. You rarely want more than that; and if you do, your gunbearer is supplied. In addition to the loops, you have leather pockets to carry your watch; your money, your matches and tobacco, your compass-anything you please. They are handy and safe. The tropical climate is too "sticky" to get much comfort, or anything else, out of ordinary pockets.

In addition, you supply your gunbearer with a cartridge belt, a leather or canvas carrying bag, water bottle for him and for yourself, a sheath knife and a whetstone. In the bag are your camera, tape line, the whetstone, field cleaners and lunch. You personally carry your field glasses, sun glasses, a knife, compass, matches, police whistle and notebook. The field glasses should not be more than six power; and if possible you should get the sort with detachable prisms. The prisms are apt to cloud in a tropical climate, and the non-detachable sort are almost impossible for a layman to clean. Hang these glasses around your neck by a strap only just long enough to permit you to raise them to your eyes. The best notebook is the "loose-leaf" sort. By means of this you can keep always a fresh leaf on top; and at night can transfer your day's notes to safe keeping in your tin box. The sun glasses should not be smoked or dark-you can do nothing with them-but of the new amberol, the sort that excludes the ultra-violet rays, but otherwise makes the world brighter and gayer. Spectacle frames of non-corrosive white metal, not steel, are the proper sort.

To clean your guns you must supply plenty of oil, and then some more. The East African gunbearer has a quite proper and gratifying, but most astonishing horror for a suspicion of rust;and to use oil any faster he would have to drink it.

Other Equipment. All this has taken much time to tell about, it has not done much toward filling up that tin box. Dump in your toilet effects and a bath towel, two or three scalpels for taxidermy, a ball of string, some safety-pins, a small tool kit, sewing materials, a flask of brandy, kodak films packed in tin, a boxed thermometer, an aneroid (if you are curious as to elevations), journal, tags for labelling trophies, a few yards of gun cloth, and the medicine kit.

The latter divides into two classes: for your men and for yourself. The men will suffer from certain well defined troubles:

"tumbo," or overeating; diarrhaea, bronchial colds, fever and various small injuries. For "tumbo" you want a liberal supply of Epsom's salts; for diarrhaea you need chlorodyne; any good expectorant for the colds; quinine for the fever; permanganate and plenty of bandages for the injuries. With this lot you can do wonders. For yourself you need, or may need, in addition, a more elaborate lot: Laxative, quinine, phenacetin, bismuth and soda, bromide of ammonium, morphia, camphor-ice, and asperin. Aclinical thermometer for whites and one for blacks should be included. A tin of malted milk is not a bad thing to take as an emergency ration after fever.

By this time your tin box is fairly well provided. You may turn to general supplies.

同类推荐
  • 三洞修道仪

    三洞修道仪

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 夕堂永日绪论

    夕堂永日绪论

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 瑜伽莲华部念诵法

    瑜伽莲华部念诵法

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • Following the Equator

    Following the Equator

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 佛说三摩竭经

    佛说三摩竭经

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
热门推荐
  • 一字轮王佛顶要略念诵法

    一字轮王佛顶要略念诵法

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 绝世废柴女

    绝世废柴女

    天啦,人家只是在新婚之夜去上了个茅房,怎么就迷迷糊糊地跑错了洞房,嫁错了新郎?没关系,杀人灭口之后,一切就都没发生过。。。。咦,哪里冒出来这么多的帅哥型男搅局?人家可是很专一的……
  • 狂妃难驯:误惹冷魅腹黑王

    狂妃难驯:误惹冷魅腹黑王

    【本书系列文《萌妃吊炸天:帝君你挺住》已上传。且看扮猪吃虎腹黑小痞子如何攻陷美貌如花伪高冷男神!】她是被逐出家门的废材小姐,“未婚先孕”,受人唾弃;他是艳绝天下的妖孽邪王,却疼她、宠她、爱她入骨;太子来退婚?他抖出一纸婚书:“不好意思,你来晚了。三界为聘,六道做礼,她已是我娘子!”公主来找茬?他摆开百万魔军:“谁敢动我家媳妇一根寒毛,我就灭谁一个国度!”却不料,她横眉冷对,一脚踹出:“谁是你娘子?拜堂了吗?领证了吗?”他不慌不忙勾唇邪笑,抖出一只无辜毛团:“诺,儿子都有了,莫非你想赖账?”
  • 重生之无双战防

    重生之无双战防

    重生归来,意想不到的人生从此展开!多位面的跨越,最终铲除罪魁祸首,成就非凡人生。
  • 木叶豪侠传

    木叶豪侠传

    嗯......好吧我承认这是个披着火影外衣的玄幻小说...也有说武侠小说的......谁知道呢....(死人脸π_π)
  • 星空典狱长

    星空典狱长

    3030年,人类探索宇宙的脚步刚刚迈出太阳系,一位小人物因为一颗石蛋,开启了不一样的人生。地球?太阳系?不,小人物的目标是浩瀚的星空,成为一方宇宙之主。
  • 黑色佣兵团(北境三部曲)

    黑色佣兵团(北境三部曲)

    小人物,大历史,书写不一样的阴谋与宿命。如果你有勇气翻开我们的历史,记住,这个世界,没有所谓的正义必将战胜邪恶;这个世界,没有所谓的正义或是邪恶。晴天里一个霹雳击中绿玉城郊外邪兽墓,削去半边符文——怪雨天降石雕泣血飞鹰逃窜青藤枯萎,接二连三的异相将原本暴动不断的南方港城一步步推向内战深渊,受雇驻守的黑色佣兵团眼见将同当权雇主葬身此地,一艘诡异的黑色巨船悄然而至,船上,来自北方的神秘使节向佣兵团伸出邀约之手:他想雇用兵团前往北境——这,本该是根救命稻草。但当数千佣兵踏上甲板,以为躲过命中大劫,却发现新雇主与封印在北方大坟茔的古老邪魔——帝王与夫人有着千丝万缕的联系。
  • 四川曲艺史话

    四川曲艺史话

    本书给了四川曲艺一个简洁、明快的艺术定义,对众多曲种进行了三级分类法,介绍了从汉代到近代四川曲艺的发展情况等。
  • 华严一乘教义分齐章义苑疏

    华严一乘教义分齐章义苑疏

    本书为公版书,为不受著作权法限制的作家、艺术家及其它人士发布的作品,供广大读者阅读交流。汇聚授权电子版权。
  • 黄金精神照耀诸天万界

    黄金精神照耀诸天万界

    死在末世中的普通上班族莫长明穿越到了异世界的意大利,而当他在加入当地最强的黑帮组织“PASSION”时给灭掉的打火机重新点了个火后,又被一箭插进了另一个世界……从此,带着自己的替身,莫长明开始了自己在一个个不同的世界里的奇妙冒险。