CAMPS, TRANSPORT, ETC.
BY CLIVE PHILLIPPS-WOLLEY
It is not possible to devise a camp outfit which would suffice in all
climates and under every condition of travel, and for that reason a few
notes on the special outfit necessary for each country have been given
where requisite.
But, although different climates require different camp equipment,
there are many things common to camp life all over the globe, and a
brief sketch of the needs and shifts of such a life in temperate,
tropical and arctic countries may at any rate serve as a basis upon
which to found a plan of campaign in any country.
It must be understood from the outset that these notes are for the
hunter and not for the scientific explorer, whose needs are excellently
cared for in the Royal Geographical Society’s ‘Hints to Travellers,’
and that the beau-ideal hunter is he who can accomplish most with
the least assistance from anyone else. The most perfect outfit is
that which, while it contains all things really necessary to success,
includes no superfluities, and is in the highest degree portable.
The cost of hiring help in different countries has of course an immense
effect upon the nature of the camp equipment employed, and what would
be but a beggarly outfit in India where you pay your beaters 3_d._ per
diem would be extravagantly luxurious in British Columbia where you pay
your Indians 1½ dollar a day.
But to succeed all the world over in big game shooting, a man should
be able not only to find his own game and kill it when found, but to
skin it, pack it, pack his own food on his shoulders or his horse’s as
the circumstances require, cook his dinner, choose and pitch his camp;
in fact, he should be able to do everything which he wants done for
himself without aid from anyone else.
It by no means follows that because a man _can_ do these things he will
be obliged to do them, but there are times in every hunter’s life at
which the almighty dollar fails him, and then it is that the beauty of
being able to help himself becomes apparent. It is not a bad plan just
for once (say for a single day) to do entirely without extraneous aid.
At the end of the day you will probably find that a good many things,
from tying a bowline knot to lighting a camp fire, look a good deal
simpler than they are.
We will consider then, first, what are the essentials of camp life
and camp outfit in countries where the temperature ranges during the
shooting season from 80° above to say 10° below zero, a fair sample of
which may be found on the _mainland_ of British Columbia.
One of the first maxims I would lay down is, bring with you all the
most important items of your outfit, rifles, ammunition, tents, &c.,
even though the cost of transport be heavy; but, on the other hand, do
not load yourself with less important items, such as rugs, blankets,
cooking utensils, saddles and smaller things. You can get most of the
ordinary necessaries of life in every country you enter, and in nine
cases out of ten the native manages to evolve the article best suited
to the daily needs of the country he lives in and the life he leads,
e.g. the so-called Mexican saddle or the Indian moccasin. There is
another thing worth considering, and that is that if you must spend
money somewhere upon your outfit, it is as well to spend it where the
spending of it may earn you the goodwill and assistance of the people
amongst whom you are going to hunt.
[Illustration: THE CAMP]
The first matter to be considered upon reaching your starting point,
the point I mean at which the locomotive leaves you, is the question
of transport, a very serious matter to the man who has been ‘dumped’
down for the first time in his life at a frontier station with a huge
pile of belongings and not even a friendly porter to carry them under
shelter for him.
In North America (indeed, in most countries) the commonest method of
transporting freight from one point to another in regions where the
railway does not run is by pack animals, for which reason we will treat
of ‘packing’ with pack ponies first.
In all the countries known to the writer the cheapest way is to buy
your ponies, taking your chances of selling them when you don’t require
them any longer. Hiring your animals is an expensive plan, especially
in America, where the hire of a pack pony is at least one dollar per
diem, whereas his cost would not exceed thirty dollars. Thus even if
you gave your ponies away (and you cannot always do much better) at
the end of a two months’ trip, you would have saved thirty dollars
by purchasing outright. In buying your pack animals don’t leave the
purchase of them until the last moment. If you do, there is no one in
the world who better understands the art of extracting the highest
price from a man who _must_ buy than the ‘untutored savage.’
Choose animals of short cobby build rather than those which are more
‘leggy,’ and in addition to all the ordinary precautions observed in
dealing with horse-flesh, take care to examine your purchases to see
whether they have ever had sore backs. If you find scars, however well
the wound has healed, don’t buy the pony, as backs which have once been
sore are extremely apt to break out again at the first opportunity.
You may estimate the number of ponies wanted for your expedition by the
weight which you require them to carry, allowing from 150 to 200 lbs.
to each pony, and although professional packers will sometimes put as
much as 400 lbs. upon a beast on a road, 200 lbs. is a full load for
such a creature as the ordinary cayuse on such trails as those which
generally lead to game countries.
Having bought your ponies and hired a man as camp cook who can pack and
look after the beasts, take precautions against losing your animals.
Of course your packer ought to do this, but he won’t. Buy picket pegs
and ropes for your saddle-horses, and good leather hobbles for the pack
animals, as well as a bell for the leader of the pack train, and see,
_personally_, that for the first few nights, at any rate, _every_ horse
is hobbled or picketed, including even your hunter’s horse, in spite of
his protestations that ‘that cayuse won’t stray’; and see, too, that
one of the horses has the bell on at night. During the day you can take
the bell off or silence it by shoving a fir cone into it, or some such
simple device, if you hope to see game along the trail; but at night,
insist upon the bell and the hobbles being worn, and in this way even
if your beasts have only poor feed they won’t stray far, whilst if
they do the bell will help you to find them. As I pen these lines I
am as sure that some one of my readers will curse his luck for having
neglected this advice as I am that death and the taxman will arrive in
due season. In passing, I may remark that the man who takes the trouble
to silence his pack train’s bell and his packers’ mouths, whilst he
rides half a mile ahead of his train when on the march, will secure
many a shot which would otherwise never have fallen to his share.
In picketing your horses use a bowline knot, see that the loop made
will run easily round the tree to which each horse is tied if you are
not using a proper picket, and in any case see that there are no bushes
or stumps in his way round which he can get tied up in the night.
Next to your ponies your pack-saddles are the most important part
of your equipment, and though you can no doubt pack either with
ordinary pack-saddles, or with _parfleches_ (mere leathern envelopes
depending from either side of the pony), still the best of all the many
contrivances for packing is, to my mind, the _aparejo_, an arrangement
of Mexican origin obtainable for about twenty-five dollars all over
America.
With good aparejos, sweat-pads and saddle-blankets of stout material,
and a man who knows how to put them all on, there need be no sore
backs, and very few halts to rearrange packs during the longest trip in
the roughest country.
[Illustration: 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.
_Provisions and other requisites for five men for two months_
lbs.
Flour 6 sacks = 300
Yeast-powder 18 tins
Bacon = 100
Dried apples = 50
Sugar = 50
Beans = 50
Coffee = 12
Tea = 8
(or Cocoa = 12)
Pepper = 1
Salt = 30
Onions = 60
Worcester sauce
Matches
Candles (three dozen composite)
Soap
Tobacco
A small can of oil for rifles
Spare rope
Two dozen horse-shoes, nails, and a shoeing hammer
A few yards of linen for dish cloths
Ten pounds of powdered alum for curing skins
Two spare deer-skins for patching moccasins; some waxed thread,
which must serve your turn until you can get some sinews,
to sew your moccasins with
A cobbler’s awl and needle
File
A housewife containing buttons, thread, needles, darning needle,
wool, &c.
A little ingenuity and abundance of good temper
In this list I have only allowed enough bacon for men who know how to
hunt in a country where game is to be had for the hunting. Of course
if game is scarce, more supplies might be needed, whilst equally of
course, if the country is very difficult and the temptation sufficient,
keen men should be able to get along with half a pound of flour and
four rashers of bacon per diem, and even this with tea, blankets,
rifles, cartridges, &c., will be found quite enough to carry in a
mountain country with no one to help you.
I have suggested cocoa as an alternative for tea, for I find that the
latter, as it is generally brewed in camp, is intensely indigestible,
and is apt to keep even a tired man awake at night. Cocoa, on the other
hand, is refreshing, it is almost as effectual a ‘pick-me-up’ as a
whisky and soda, and does very well in its place. For men who do not
stop to lunch, cakes of chocolate or raisins are recommended, as being
very portable and nutritious.
My second list of necessaries consists of kitchen gear, and although
it may easily be reduced to a ‘billy,’ a frying-pan, and your fingers
if needs must, it is as it stands about as small as is compatible with
comfort. Cups, plates, &c., should all be made of what is known as
‘granite iron,’ as this material is very strong, will not crush like
tin, and retains heat a long time, an important point when your meals
are taken in the open air of an October evening in the mountains.
_Kitchen gear_
One nine-inch iron pot with a ‘nest’ of three smaller pots
inside; these should all be ‘tinned’ or enamelled inside
Two tin milk-pans for kneading dough in
Two coffee-cans or ‘billies’
Two frying-pans to make dampers and fry bacon. Have these made
with folding handles
Five soup-plates, five tea-cups (both plates and cups to be made
of enamelled iron)
Five knives, five forks, five soup-spoons, five tea-spoons, one
meat-knife, a big cooking fork, one small meat saw
Two axes and two spare axe-handles
Almost of more importance than either food or kitchen gear is the
sportsman’s ‘sleeping outfit,’ if I may use the jargon of the camp.
The common A tent is the one most used in America, but probably there
is nothing better than that known as Whymper’s Alpine tent, made
of Willesden canvas, as recommended in ‘Hints to Travellers.’ For
extremely rough work I have used a little ‘tente d’abri’ into which we
had to crawl on our hands and knees, but which held two men, kept them
dry, and weighed with poles, pegs, ropes, and a bag to pack it in, only
nineteen pounds.
I am inclined to think that even this weight might be lessened if
required. But whatever the tent you use, you should in all cases have
a floor to fit it, rather larger than the ground covered by the tent,
and made of some stout waterproof material. This floor may be made to
attach to the sides of the tent if so desired.
A sleeping bag or blankets must be taken for each person, and if
blankets are used, three pairs of four-point Hudson Bay blankets if
properly arranged will suffice to keep a man fairly warm, even with
the thermometer 10° below zero. But they must be properly arranged,
and to do this one pair of blankets should be sewn up at the bottom,
along the whole of one side, and halfway up the other side, the other
half to be fitted with tapes or buttons. This makes a kind of bag
which effectually prevents a man from throwing off his clothes in his
sleep, and keeps out those bitter little draughts which otherwise so
annoyingly creep in and dispel the soundest slumbers. An inflatable
air-cushion is light to pack, and handy either as a pillow or as a
seat in camp. The air-cushion makes a better seat than pillow, for
which the writer always uses a canvas bag packed with spare clothes,
flannels, &c., carried inside the roll of blankets. The sleeping bag
made of blankets, with an outside covering of tarpaulin to lace up over
the blankets, and with a hood or pillow-case of tarpaulin attached to
hold pillow or canvas clothes-bag, is the most convenient outfit of
the kind for America. Before leaving the subject of beds, a subject
of the utmost moment to the hunter, let me point out that one of the
most comfortable and simplest of camp bedsteads may be made thus. Let
your _manteau_ measure 6 ft. 6 ins. by 4 ft., and let it be made of
the strongest waterproof canvas, two pieces of equal size being sewn
together so as to make an endless sack. In this form your _manteau_
will do duty as a cover for the packs by day, and at night you can cut
two thin poles about 7 ft. 6 ins. long, pass them lengthwise through
this endless sack, take two logs about a foot in diameter and 5 ft. or
more in length, and cut notches in them 4 ft. apart; then set one at
your feet and one at your head, stretch out your _manteau_ and rest the
ends of the poles in the notches, and in ten minutes you will have made
yourself a spring mattress above the reach of the damp. If, however,
you are content with a brush bed--and the sweet aromatic balsam boughs
should be good enough for any man--cut only the smaller boughs and
arrange them in rows, the points of each row overlapping and covering
the thick and hard butts of the row above. Hemlock makes the best of
all bedding, and keeps out damp better than any other brush. It is a
good plan before finally arranging your bed to lie down on it, find
out where your hip-bone comes, and dig out a hollow for it to fit into.
Anyone who has slept upon a hard and absolutely level surface will
understand why this is recommended.
Finally, as to clothing, I have ventured to recommend a list of simple
necessaries, more as a hint to those preparing for an expedition than
as a rule for their guidance. In his choice of clothes, every man will
to a certain extent follow his own fancy, but there are some few things
essential to health, and others essential to success. For still hunting
in timber I consider moccasins, or at any rate tennis shoes, essential.
For a tender-footed man tennis shoes with thick red india-rubber soles
are the very best of foot-gear. Except that you cannot cling with them
as you can with the moccasin, they are nearly as good as the latter,
and certainly save your feet as you come down hill, among sharp loose
stones, in the dark; but they are hard to repair, and impossible to
replace in the woods. Flannel is the best thing to wear next to your
skin, and a good supply of dry flannels to put on when you come in at
night is of the utmost importance. A pair of ‘rubber shoes’ to slip
on in camp is well worth carrying, so that if you are obliged to go
out in the snow or slush after you have made yourself comfortable for
the night, you need not wet your feet again. Let your clothes be of
some neutral tint; my own especial weakness is an Indian hunting-shirt
made as plainly as possible of tanned deerskin. The colour of this is
excellent; the material is very light and tough, and when you top a
ridge to which you have painfully climbed for half an hour, the bitter
wind which meets you does not go through a buckskin shirt as easily
as it does through tweed or homespun. In wet weather--i.e. in real
drenching rain--such a shirt is not as good by any means as tweed,
as it then becomes exceedingly cold and unpleasant to wear. A broad
belt of webbing (not of leather, for leather cuts you) to contain your
cartridges may be used over the shirt, if it has not a great brass
fastening in front as most belts have. The object of this fastening
I suppose is to reflect the sun’s rays and make a dazzling spot of
light on the abdomen of the hunter, about as useful in attracting the
attention of every living thing as anything which the ingenuity of the
gentlemen who sell ‘sporting goods’ could contrive. Metal buttons,
metal watch-chains, uncovered rifle barrels, and even the end of your
stalking glass, will reflect the sun’s rays in the same dangerous
manner, so that though you may be otherwise unnoticed, the attention of
your quarry will be drawn to what appears to him to be a little star
amongst the grass on the other side of the ravine. Added to the dangers
of their appearance is the danger that if you wear any metal trappings
about your person, they may ring against one another terribly loud
and clear just at the moment when even the beating of your own heart
seems unwarrantably and absurdly noisy. For these reasons avoid metal
adornments; keep a loose cover over your rifle barrels, be careful not
to catch the sun’s rays with your glass when spying, use a watch-chain
of buckskin, and don’t carry a lot of loose change in your trousers
pocket.
Attached to your belt will probably be a knife for administering a
_coup de grâce_, and for skinning. If you would not lose it, adopt some
such plan for securing it as is suggested by the accompanying woodcut.
None of the ordinary spring fastenings are proof against the rough
usage of the hills.
[Illustration: Knife fastening]
If you wear knickerbockers, have them made loose at the knee, so as not
to hamper you in your stride up hill, or wear them _unfastened_ at the
knee; but though less smart in appearance, ordinary tweed or flannel
trousers, with the bottoms tucked into a stout pair of woollen socks,
are as workmanlike as anything ever made.
Whatever you do, don’t wear canvas overalls, although you may be
strongly advised to do so. I wore a pair once, and in a week they were
so ragged that I had to borrow a _petticoat_ in which to return to
civilisation, and, moreover, they are not only easily torn, but they
emit a strident scraping sound, whenever a twig touches them, which can
be heard very far off.
Loose buckskin gloves sound rather luxurious wear for a hunter, but the
hardest Siwash wears them; and as your hands have often as rough usage
among the rocks as your feet, they are necessary. Below is a list of
clothes, &c., for a two months’ trip in temperate climates.
_Clothing for two months_
Two tweed suits
One buckskin shirt
Two tweed caps
Four flannel shirts
Four pairs of flannel drawers
Six pairs of woollen socks or stockings
Moccasins: the number of these depends entirely upon the nature
of the shooting. After ibex, I have worn out a pair in a morning,
but for ordinary work a pair of good thick moccasins should last
four or five days
Eight handkerchiefs: not white, but some dull colour which will
not attract attention from afar, if inadvertently pulled out in
sight of game
One pair of short waterproof boots (gum boots)
One waterproof cape, such as is made by Cording; an armless
contrivance, very light and portable, used I think by cyclists
Three pairs of blankets, one waterproof sheet, one air-cushion
One belt of webbing for cartridges
One pair of loose buckskin gloves, one pair of woollen mits
One boating sweater
Having now enumerated most of the essential items of a camp outfit, it
may be as well to sketch roughly the ordinary routine of a day’s march
with pack ponies.
In a well-ordered camp someone should be stirring just as the stars
begin to lose their brilliancy and to fade before the coming of
day. An early start is most important, as it goes a long way towards
ensuring an early camp, and that camp should be made early whilst there
is still plenty of daylight is of vital importance to everyone with the
expedition. The discomforts of camping in the dark only require to be
tried once to be avoided for the future.
Whilst one man lights the fire and gets the breakfast ready, let
another go for the horses, and a third put the beds together and make
the packs ready. Save time whenever you can, for unavoidable delays are
all too frequent with a pack train. A cayuse is not as other horses
are. When you have sought animals sorrowing, in the chill dawn, and
found them _hiding_, in a long line one behind another with their heads
down, behind a bush no bigger than a respectable cabbage, or have
watched your bell-horse roll his bell in the sand, shake himself to see
if it will ring, and then trot away contented, you will know more about
cayuses, and agree that they are the hardiest, most sure-footed, and
‘meanest’ of all created beings. See then that you get them together
early in the day, and have the packs on their backs and ‘all set’
within half an hour of the time at which you finish your breakfast.
When you have the ponies packed, some one of the hunters may ride well
ahead, but the man who ‘leads out,’ i.e. guides the pack train, should
never ride far ahead. If he does, the pack animals will at once begin
to stray. The best pace to travel at is a fairly brisk walk; anything
more than this generally disarranges the packs and necessitates halts
to rearrange them, or causes sore backs. From fifteen to twenty-five
miles a day, according to the character of the country to be ridden
through, is an excellent day’s work for pack ponies, and from two to
three miles an hour a fair pace to travel at.
Keep your temper in driving pack ponies across a side hill, or along
a steep and narrow trail. Pack ponies are as mean as--civilised words
won’t express their ‘meanness’--and when a pony knows that he has
another between himself and the whip, and that the whip cannot reach
him owing to the narrowness of the trail, he will _stop_ and browse.
If you press the pony next you to get at the offender, one of them
will go head over heels down the slope, and at every bump there will
be little puffs, one white, one brown. This means that when that pony
reaches the bottom of that hill he may still be alive, but there will
be no more cocoa and no more baking powder for that expedition.
[Illustration: ‘Good-bye to the groceries’]
Some men remove packs in the middle of the day, and halt for lunch.
This I consider a mistake, and a waste of time. An early camp, say at
four o’clock, is better both for horses and men.
In choosing your camp consider first these points: water, food, fuel,
and shelter from wind and from the sight of such game as may be in
the neighbourhood. As to this last point, it is as well not to allow
fires to be lighted or wood chopped until a careful survey of the
neighbourhood has been made from some adjacent height, especially if
the camp has been pitched in the district which you mean to hunt. Not
long since my friends and myself had the mortification of seeing the
largest band of sheep I ever saw move away while we were stalking them,
not because they detected us, but because they could hear the ringing
strokes of our men’s axes in the valley below. A camp without feed for
the horses is the worst of all camps, and luckily occurs very rarely.
If there is any likelihood of such camps being unavoidable, it may be
necessary to carry grain for the horses, although many ‘cayuses’ will
not at first eat it, and frequently when they do eat it suffer from
lampas and other ailments consequent upon a sudden change of diet.
Lancing the bars of a horse’s mouth with a sharp penknife will procure
relief from lampas, which is probably the commonest complaint amongst
pack ponies. In camping in America, beware of camping near burnt
timber--that is to say, so near as to be in danger from a falling tree,
a constantly recurring risk where huge trunks are burnt almost through,
and high winds are common.
Whatever you do, do not camp on old Indian camping grounds. Indians
rarely leave anything worth having in a camp, but they do leave things
worth avoiding. Again, don’t be tempted to use an old horse-blanket
to put over your feet on a very cold night. Men will tell you that
the insects which infest animals won’t touch men. I remember one
unfortunate party which owned a horse suffering from the third plague
of Egypt, and owing to a careless use of one of that horse’s blankets
the plague passed on to the horse’s rider. The woodticks which infest
the woods in early spring are as omnivorous as the insects before
alluded to. When once these creatures have buried their heads in your
flesh they should be removed with care. If you leave their heads in, an
ugly sore may be the result.
Arrived in camp, let it be your first care to see that the horses are
watered, hobbled and turned into the best ‘feed’ in the neighbourhood;
see that the packs are secured against rain, and that an ample supply
of wood is cut for use during the night. In dealing with Indians don’t
do too much for yourself, however competent and willing you may be. The
majority of Indians are very apt to encourage a man willing to help
himself, by allowing him to do all the work.
Give men and horses a complete rest every Sunday, and utilise part of
the day for looking through and taking stock of your stores.
There is still another list of necessaries to be added to those already
given, but luckily it is only a very short one. As illness may possibly
visit the hunter’s camp, he must be prepared for it, and a few simple
remedies for the ills most likely to befall him are worth providing.
Quinine for low fevers, aperient medicine of some kind (podophyllin
pills for choice), and an ounce of laudanum in case of diarrhœa or
colic, together with a few mustard plaisters, a roll of india-rubber
bandaging, and some diachylon plaister for cuts, have always proved a
sufficient medical outfit for any party to which I have belonged.
The quinine, if employed as a preventive measure, may be taken in
three-grain doses, but in case you are too late to ward fever off
double the dose.
Of laudanum twenty drops in water, when in pain or purged, is a fair
dose.
But with average luck no big game hunter ever gets ill until he returns
to civilisation and high feeding. Then, alas! his troubles begin.